February Sales: Corona Pause

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Westmount real estate, representing the top end of the Montreal real estate market, put itself on “pause” in February as the world began to hear about the coronavirus epidemic, with only five house sales posted by agents, in a range between $900,000 and $2,400,000. There does not appear to have been a flood of new homes coming on the market.

The slow start to 2020 can be expected to hesitate further. as potential buyers worry about the available cash they are going to need to purchase a new property. On the other hand, some forward-thinking buyers may consider that real estate is a safer investment than the stock market, which has been tumbling since mid-February. In 2008, the Westmount market followed the Dow/TSX averages through the year, an indication that Westmount homebuyers were interested in the value of their investment, not just the roof over their heads, and as with the 2008-09 recession, the return of a positive attitude in the financial market had a tremendous effect on the local real estate market.

The five February sales had an average mark-up of only 2.3 percent, way down from the 16.6 percent average in January, but of course much of this can be blamed on the low February volume. As well, we expect several late-posted sales for February, much as happened in January, when six late-month sales were not posted until mid-February.

Only one extra condominium sale was posted in February, along with two adjacent-Westmount houses, one on Redpath St. in the “Golden Square Mile” and the other on Barat Rd. just east of the city limits. The early indication is that the adjacent-Westmount market is slow to start the year, with no more than two sales in any of the districts.

At last check the number of active listings for Westmount houses crept up from 96 to 97, only one of which is asking less than $1 million, four of which are asking over $10 million. Twenty-two houses are available for rent, with three of those asking more than $10,000 per month.

Stay well, and we’ll get through this together.

Posted by andy February 2020

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