(The Canadian Press)

By Glenn Hicks

housing market

P.A.’s housing slump continues as other cities surge

Jun 5, 2019 | 2:17 PM

Prince Albert’s continued depressed housing market is surprising even the optimists, as other cities enjoy a spring upturn.

While Saskatoon is seeing a significant rebound this year, and the Battlefords had a very big jump in sales last month, Prince Albert’s slump shows no signs of abating with a 23 per cent downturn in sales compared to May 2018.

…maybe people aren’t as confident, even though this is one of the most active times _{– Jason Yochim}

“I’m a bit surprised, I’d hoped – and I tend to be an optimist – that [P.A.] would have also seen a little stronger increase in sales,” Jason Yochim the CEO of the Saskatoon Region Association of Realtors (SRAR) told paNOW after the organization released its May sales figures. “But I’m still confident that will come.”

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Yochim said people needed to have a comfort level about the long term and not put themselves at financial risk with larger investments. His analysis of the current situation in P.A. was that buyers still lacked confidence.

“[The stats] might tell you that if things are a bit slow maybe people aren’t as confident, even though this is one of the most active times in the cycle in terms of sales,” he said.

According to the SRAR figures only 34 sales happened in the city last month, compared to 44 in May 2018. In the wider Prince Albert region there were 53 sales, down 16 per cent from last May. A total of 212 properties have sold in P.A. and region so far this year.

Saskatoon and Battlefords market springs to life

By contrast, in Saskatoon sales for May rose by 16 per cent at 422 units, driven largely by condo sales. Single family homes rose 13 per cent. A total of 1,469 homes have sold in Saskatoon so far this year.

Warman, Martensville and Dalmeny saw a three-year high of 561 home sales for May, an increase of 14 per cent on the previous year.

Also a big improvement was recorded in The Battlefords region with a 52 per cent jump in sales in May, to 50 units, which is almost the same as the wider Prince Albert region.

Despite the gloomy sales data for Prince Albert, Yochim noted the average price of a home in the city actually increased by four per cent to $234,972 in May, because some of the properties that did sell were in the higher end.

Yochim said historically there had been a trickle-down effect after some time lag for Prince Albert’s upturn when things take off in Saskatoon, but “you still need to have confidence in the community, or some job creation or announcement to sustain that.”

Yochim maintained the work set to start soon on the single University of Saskatchewan campus in the downtown would have a positive impact even before the opening scheduled for the fall of 2020.

“It’ll address several aspects of the housing market: from rental, to investors buying property for rentals, to people moving into the city for jobs in advance of the development, and jobs for the long haul,” he said.

—

glenn.hicks@jpbg.ca

On Twitter:@princealbertnow