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EDMONTON – By the end of the year, Edmonton could get something it hasn’t seen for several years — a “normalized” housing market — as homes for sale dry up and prices drop .
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# J2 a. `8 t kThat’s the forecast contained in the House Price Survey and Market Survey Forecast released Thursday by Royal LePage Real Estate Services. 6 d7 |% Q0 [* C: ]2 [ n* h
+ ?4 e; w2 M7 h* w. ~A soaring number of homes put on the market especially by builders and speculators in the last year softened the city’s housing market during the second quarter, the report said.
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5 ?/ _/ @" e p0 p! ?$ d“The high inventory levels will dwindle into the second half of the year, and as affordability improves, subsequent market conditions will continue to normalize,” the report said. * K0 @" O4 E. b0 m
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As of the end of Wednesday, there were 11,184 homes for sale on the Multiple Listing Service, according to the Realtors’ Association of Edmonton. ) Y) w6 @# R" j8 C7 @1 c# y/ g
2 a- M& z* w9 eBut Alberta’s two biggest cities still boast some of the most expensive real estate in the country, it noted.
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“Despite some mild price erosion during the second quarter in both Calgary and Edmonton, these markets remain strong. Although prices have come down from where they were last year — one of the best years on record — current house prices are far higher than they were three years ago before energy-rich Alberta experienced its boom.” 3 B7 O3 K4 K: _9 J1 i
( s( c0 ^5 E% W5 y5 bThe average price for a detached bungalow in Edmonton in April, May and June was $320,000, down about 14.5 per cent from the same period in 2007 ($374,143), Royal LePage said in its survey of Canadian house prices. : k! Y2 r* Z) g% y7 k+ y
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In the second quarter of 2008, a two-storey house in Edmonton sold for an average price of $348,571, down 12.4 per cent year-over-year from $397,857. 2 a3 Y2 | |6 S/ @" U
) H( F0 O) H% A7 a- T$ qAn average condominium in Edmonton was priced at $226,000, down 14.2 per cent from $263,333 in the comparable 2007 period.
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8 C" D$ @' c* F) X/ o# u“A surge in inventory caused Alberta’s white-hot market to record the country’s only major-market price decreases,” the report said. 1 J, J2 |' [# h" s6 n% A# z
& |) j ^; w3 hAcross most of the country, average house prices rose, but more slowly than the spikes seen in 2006 and 2007. + U* { M$ x* g9 w) u7 Y
( J( a, d# j7 V# K1 u8 e6 F6 b7 URoyal LePage forecasts the national average house price to rise by 3.5 per cent, to $318,000 by year’s end.
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The report predicts home sale transactions to decrease by 11.5 per cent to 461,000 unit sales by year’s end. |
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