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Buyer Beware; It's A Sellers Market In CK

It is the best time in the history of Chatham-Kent real-estate for sellers, but one agency says homeowners deciding to get into the market better have a plan or they could end up homeless.

The Association of Realtors released statistics for the first half of 2018 Wednesday and according to president Steve Carroll, it has been quite the anomaly.

"What we are experiencing is certainly a market that I have never seen and I've been in it 25 years," Carroll said. "Some of the stats are the lowest or highest in history that we're experiencing. We've never had a situation where we've been this much out of balance and favouring sellers more than buyers."

According to Carroll, while it is a seller's market because prices are higher than ever, properties are also selling at record speeds. How quick homes are sold is calculated as "months of inventory." The average for this time of year is 5.8, which means it would take 5.8 months to sell all the current homes on the market. Right now, however, CK is at a record 1.6. Carroll said the lack of inventory is a factor as usually there'd be around 400 homes on the market and as of the end of June there were 206.

Carroll said if someone decides to list their home with no plan for what happens when it sells and it sells fast, there could be big problems.

"The worst case scenario is you don't have a house to live in," Carroll said. "If you've sold your home and you haven't been able to purchase a home that meets your needs then you're in a difficult situation. That's why we always tell people to have a plan as to what they're doing."

One of the main contributors driving prices up to record highs is record lows in total homes available. The number of active listings at the end of June was down 24.8%t compared to last year and marked the lowest level for the month in history. While on the flip side the year-to-date average house price was $198,975, up 5.8% from the first half of 2017.

According to the statistics, while homes available are at an all-time low, total sales are still above historical averages and it is this complete imbalance that has buyers pulling out their hair, especially for those looking to up-size or downsize within the municipality.

"They're seeing prices higher than we have probably ever seen," Carroll said. "We are getting a lot of interested buyers from outside of Chatham-Kent. They are coming from higher cost areas so the prices we have here really aren't scaring them. They sold their home for really good numbers and they see our prices and, though they are increasing, they still see our prices as attractive."

Carroll said the shift in the market occurred early 2017 and while he admitted things could change drastically really quickly, he isn't seeing any signs of change CK any time soon.

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