Residential sales recorded by the Real Estate Board of the Fredericton Area Inc. were down from a year earlier in August 2017.
Residential property sales numbered 194 units in August, a decline of 7.6% from the same month last year. That said, it was above the five-year average for the month and slightly above the 10-year average as well.
Year-to-date residential property sales numbered 1,584 through the first eight months of 2017, up 6% from 2016 and an eight-year high for the period.
August 2017 sales priced from $150,000 to $250,000 edged down by one sale on a year-over-year basis, while sales in the range from $250,000 to $350,000 fell 32.4% (12 sales). The number of sales priced between $350,000 and $500,000 dropped by 50% (7 sales) and there were two fewer sales priced above $500,000.
The residential average price was $166,135 in August 2017, down 11.4% from August 2016. The less volatile year-to-date average price was $184,701, edging down just 0.8% from this time last year. The bigger picture on prices is that they have been more or less stable over the last six years.
New listings numbered 303 units in August 2017. This was a 17.4% decrease from a year earlier and the lowest August reading since 2003.
Overall supply has been trending downward over the last two years. There were 1,364 active residential listings on the Board�s MLS® System at the end of August, down 16.9% from levels recorded a year earlier.
There were seven months of inventory at the end of August 2017, down from 7.8 months at the end of August 2016 and below the long-run average for this time of year. The number of months of inventory is the number of months it would take to sell current inventories at the current rate of sales activity.
The value of all residential sales activity in August 2017 was $32.2 million, falling 18.1% from year-ago levels.
Sales of all types of properties numbered 217 units in August, down 5.2% on a year-over-year basis. The combined value of all property sales totalled $34.2 million, falling 16.2% from August 2016.
