There’s so much uncertainty and a whole lot of anxiety regarding how healthy – or unhealthy – the real estate market is going to be as we move into post-pandemic times, whenever that’s going to be. You certainly can’t blame people who are apprehensive about putting their homes on the market, and the same goes for others who aren’t sure if it’s wise to be buying a home at this time either.
Now of course that anxiety is going to be a reality for people who work in the real estate industry themselves. We’ve already established that major urban centres with more demand than supply realities are going to be more insulated against strong dips in the market, but there’s going to be noticeable downturns everywhere in light of what this is.
All of this is going to make the competitive nature of the real estate business even more competitive. It’s always been a scenario where anything you can do to gain an advantage is something you should pursue, and now perhaps even more so. Here at Real Estate Leads, our online real estate lead generation service is an excellent way for you to be put directly in touch with people who are genuinely considering making a move in the real estate market – and do so before any of the competition has the same chance to do so.
But back to our topic, there are actually reasons to think more positively regarding the outlook for the housing market across Canada as a whole. Here’s why.
Likely 5 to 10% Gain By Year End
A renowned and premier economist in Canada, Peter Norman, is stating that Canada’s home prices are still likely to see a 5%-10% annual gain by year-end. Behind this belief is an understanding that despite the COVID-19 travel restrictions grinding the entry of wealthy foreign homebuyers to a halt, housing will probably return to an upward trajectory in late 2020.
There is plenty of fluidity to the situation, however, and that may mean there’s going to be a few valleys before we get to the modest peak. We need to keep all of this in context, and we will preface all of this by saying that nobody can or should be even trying to state that they’re forecasting with any degree of certainty.
One thing that is for certain is that we can expect to see migration being really weak for the remainder of the year, and perhaps beyond that. Immigration and homebuyers who are new to the country has been a macro driver for housing in general for a long time now.
We should also expect the pressures upon Canadian demographics and the economy to stay strong throughout the second quarter and even well into the third quarter, and the consensus across the board is that the numbers for the April-June period are very likely going to be pretty ugly.
However, what is likely going to be a positive countermeasure here is the housing sector’s fundamentals that may create a clearer path for the market’s speedy recovery once the crisis has passed.
Better Insulated
It’s not going to be helpful for anyone to overreact to seeing house prices go down in the immediate scenario, and we should also keep in mind that the country as a whole is much better positioned to be resilient as compared to other ones around the world. This is also true because the national economy is similarly poised to bounce back more emphatically.
We will see prices be all over the map for the next few quarters, and there are going to be both fewer homes on the market AND fewer buyers qualified to make offers on them. However, it’s almost certainly not going to be to the extent that many people are suggesting it will be.
Many in this industry are united in saying that by the time we get to the end of the year and momentum comes back, pent-up demand from the downtime and supply coming back on stream in the resale market is going to the buoying that the market is going to need to be in a better place than naysayers are insisting it’s going to be.
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