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Chatham

Home sales set new December record

The Chatham-Kent Association of Realtors says 80 homes were sold in December 2018, a new record for the month.

The sales figure also represents a jump of 33.3 per cent from the same month last year.

Ninety-five new listings went on the market in December, a huge increase of 163.9 per cent on a year-over-year basis.

"We had more units come on the market in December, which certainly helped sales because we've been dealing with a shortage of product for quite some time now," said President Steve Carroll. "So this sorta helped to alleviate that to some degree."

Home sales in 2018 were down 4.9 per cent compared to 2017, but overall it was still one of the better years on record.

"It was a little frustrating for buyers because of the low inventory, which we're not accustomed to around here," said Carroll. "The other thing that buyers were involved in, was competitive offer situations, which was frustrating for them, good for sellers but frustrating for buyers.

"There are a lot of buyers, lots of buyers," added Carroll. "We still have a good situation where people coming out of GTA and coming out of the Golden Horseshoe area to come to our area because of our very attractive pricing on houses. Again that's bringing some of that and that's been going on for some time too."

Carroll said he believes home sales will continue to be strong in 2019.

"Our prices may continue to increase, and the activity, we think it will continue. And again, there's a certain percentage, about a third of the sales that are coming from folks coming from the high costs areas," he said.

The average price of homes sold in December was $214,094, a 31.4 per cent increase over the same month the previous year.

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