The British Columbia Real Estate Association (BCREA) is reporting a 27 per cent decline in home sales compared to the same month last year, according to latest numbers it released yesterday.
Prices followed the same trend: There average home price was $678,625, a decline of 9.3 per cent from February 2018.
Total sales dollar volume was $3.08 billion, a 33.8 per cent decline from the same month last year.
“Prospective home buyers continue to be sidelined by the mortgage stress test,” said Brendon Ogmundson, BCREA Deputy Chief Economist.
“Despite a strong BC labour market, sales remained slow in February,” he added.
“Falling mortgage rates should provide some relief for homebuyers, providing a small boost to affordability heading into the spring,” added Ogmundson.
In January this year, BCREA reported that real estate sales saw a decline of 24.5 per cent in 2018 compared to 2017.
BCREA is also calling on the federal government to revisit the B-20 stress test so that more BC families can afford to buy a home.
Mortgage lending rules, known as the B-20 stress test, have eroded housing affordability by reducing the purchasing power of families by as much as 20 per cent, said BCREA.
Introduced last year, the stress test requires potential buyers to qualify at an interest rate that is two percentage points above the rate they negotiate with their bank.
Meanwhile, national home sales are likely to fall to a near decade low in 2019 because of rising interest rates and strict mortgage stress-test rules, according to the Canadian Real Estate Association.
