Benchmark price for detached homes in Greater Vancouver nears $1-million
The benchmark price for a typical detached home – a gauge that omits the most expensive properties – is approaching $1-million in Greater Vancouver.
The Real Estate Board of Greater Vancouver uses the resale home price index (HPI), which strips out the priciest properties, because it asserts that calculation serves as a better barometer of trends than average prices.
On Tuesday, the board reported that the HPI for single-family detached houses reached a record-high $997,800 last month, up 7.9 per cent from November, 2013.
The HPI for detached homes on Vancouver’s west side hit $2,323,300 last month, up 10.9 per cent from November, 2013, while the index for Vancouver’s east side reached $957,300, up 11.9 per cent from a year earlier. Both of those prices also set records.
The average price for detached homes sold in the region has risen 1.2 per cent over the past year to $1,274,904.
Over all, the HPI for detached houses, townhouses and condos rose to $637,300 last month in Greater Vancouver, up 5.7 per cent from a year earlier.
Greater Vancouver had 2,516 housing sales last month, up 8.4 per cent from November, 2013, and 6.9 per cent higher than the 10-year average for that month. “It’s been a more active fall than we typically see,” board president Ray Harris said in a statement.
In the Fraser Valley, which includes the sprawling and less expensive Vancouver suburb of Surrey, there were 1,136 residential sales on the Multiple Listing Service in November, up 15.2 per cent from 986 properties sold in the same month last year.
November’s HPI for Fraser Valley detached homes climbed to $575,400, up 4.6 per cent year-over-year.
Source: Brent Jang, The Globe and Mail
