Kelowna Real Estate Blog – Paige Guernsey

Kelowna home buyer survey results

Posted by paige on February 23, 2011 | 1 Comment

The Okanagan Mainline Real Estate board has been collecting information on buyer profiles… where they’re coming from and what they’re buying.  Serious buyers are taking advantage of the current market conditions while they last.  On average in the past 5 months, 57% of buyers are coming from within the Okanagan Valley, 14% from Alberta, 13% from the Lower Mainland/Vancouver Island,  7% from other areas in BC, 4% from Saskatchewan/Manitoba, 3% outside Canada and just under 2% from Eastern Canada. 

In January 2011 the shift went from predominantly first time buyers  to move-up buyers with 32% moving on up, and 27% buying for their first time. 8% downsized from single family to residential, and 8% were revenue or recreational property buyers. A small 1.6% of buyers in January moved to a Retirement Community. 

On the banking side of things the largest group, a healthy 54%, financed with a conventional mortgage and had more than a 20% down payment. 28% financed with high ratio insured mortgages and had less than 20% down and almost 19% paid cash!  Understanding where buyers come from helps form part of the big real estate picture. For instance, a change in entry level home buying can have a ripple effect through the market as many move-up buyers rely on first-timers to buy their existing homes. 

If you’d like more information on how buyer profiling can affect the sale of your home, please call me directly at 250-862-6464.

Talk to you soon…

Paige

Happy Valentines Day… a funny for you!

Posted by paige on February 14, 2011 | No Comments

CMHC just released their summary for 2010 and there are no surprises, but first a cute joke my friend shared with me on Facebook.

Talk to you soon…

Paige

Market conditions? What market conditions…?

Posted by paige on February 12, 2011 | No Comments

It’s the number one question I get asked: “What’s the market going to do?”  Kelowna’s real estate market changes periodically and is affected by various things like economic growth and interest rates and simply, it is what it is… steady. The big question is how are you going to navigate it?

“Should I buy now or wait?” Good question… How do you feel about inflation and interest rates? Do you think they’re going up?

Consider this:  If your mortgage amount today was $300,000 and your interest rate is 3.6%

     PAYMENT:  $1,518     INTEREST PAID IN 1 YEAR:  $10,676           PRINCIPAL PAID OFF IN 1 YEAR:  $7,540

If you think interest rates are going up, let’s look at the same mortgage amount with an interest rate of 5.6%

     PAYMENT:  $1,860   INTEREST PAID IN 1 YEAR:  $16,656            PRINCIPAL PAID OFF IN 1 YEAR:  $5,666

“I’m going to rent until the market hits bottom”.  Last time I checked rental rates haven’t gone down for years in Kelowna. Our vacany rate is very low keeping the rents high.  In fact, most people that crunch their numbers find that they’re rent is going to cost them more every month than the mortgage to buy the house they’re renting.  Checking Kelowna real estate stats for 2009 and 2010 (including Jan 2011), the list to sell ratio (what a house sells for vs. what it’s listed for) differed a meager 1.06%.  Looks like prices aren’t changing too much.

If you’re considering a move please don’t hesitate to call me directly at 250-862-6464.

Talk to you soon…

Paige