Clinton Wilkins and Dan Ahlstrand discuss the current real estate market with realtor Megan Landry.

<strong>Market Overview and Guest Introduction</strong>

Dan Ahlstrand
And welcome back to Mortgage 101. I’m Dan Ahlstrand. He is Clinton Wilkins, and we have been talking about the real estate market here as part of the June edition of Mortgage 101. Clinton, we go to the phones and get it right from an expert.

Clinton Wilkins
I love going from the phones. We haven’t had a guest over on the phone for a while, and I just thought, now we’re talking about real estate, we’re talking about the market. We really need to bring on a realtor. I want to get their perspective and see what’s going on. And a friend of mine, Megan Landry, has agreed to come on from the agency, and I think Megan, you should be on the line.

Megan Landry
Hello, thanks for having me.

Dan Ahlstrand
Oh, Megan, it’s our pleasure to have you here. We’ve been talking about the market; we’ve been talking about spring going into summer, some indications in some of the media reports that we’ve seen that spring was soft. Is that what you experienced out there?

Megan Landry
I mean, I’ll be honest with you, it definitely hasn’t slowed down. I think no matter what, there’s always someone that’s either trying to downsize, the job’s changing, whatever. So it’s still busy. I mean, for me personally, and some of the colleagues on our team. However, with that being said, we’re starting to see a more balanced market. Buyers have more options and more time to make a decision. We’re not really seeing the frantic bidding wars that we’ve been seeing in the past few years, and whatnot, so it’s not slowed down. I feel like it’s still balanced. We’re seeing more inventory on the market than we’re used to, so it’s a little bit lower for sellers, but a better opportunity for buyers.

Clinton Wilkins
I love that. I think we were really.. I think jonesing… I’ll use that word for a more balanced marketplace. I remember the wildness of the last five and six years, and I think having a more balanced market is better for everyone. Maybe better conditions in offers, and we’re having financing conditions, and I think it’s better for both sides of the transaction. Now, what price point are you seeing being the most hot? Like, what? What price point are you wishing there was more supply? And you’re like, yes, I have buyers for that price point. We just don’t have this supply in the marketplace.

<strong>Price Point Analysis</strong>

Megan Landry
Yeah, I know for sure. I mean, it’s been a demand, and it will continue to be a demand for first-time homebuyers, and I hate to say that $500,000 is affordable, but that’s the more affordable range to get into, and so anything around even 550 and under is really still hot, and you have to be on it as a buyer, so sellers definitely have the upper hand, I guess, in that price range, and then I think anything above like 650 to a million, it kind of lingers, and then a million plus, there is quite a bit of inventory on the market right now, I believe there’s like nine months of inventory sitting just above a million, so lots of inventory to be had that are sitting that’s sitting right now in Nova Scotia that we’re not really used to in this market, so we’re all kind of getting used to this shift, but I think it’s instead of like an emotional vibe that we’ve been used to seeing the past couple couple years, it’s more of a decision making time instead of emotional time, so it gives people, it gives people a chance to kind of sit back and think, and is this, is this worth the buy?

Dan Ahlstrand
That 500,000, 600,000 sweet spot we’ve been calling it? Is that the urban areas? Do you, do you see inventory in a lower, lower price range as you move further away from the urban area?

Megan Landry
Yeah, I mean, anything outside of HRM, the further out you get, you’ll start to see better prices. However, the demand is in HRM, of course. I mean, you have to be really strategic when it comes to a seller and selling a home. Asking, is it priced right? Is it marketed correctly? And how does it show? And that’s really the sweet spot.

Clinton Wilkins
Well, I think sellers, and I think in some ways they kind of got complacent and lazy because they had such an upper hand the last few years. But I think, and you can correct me if I’m wrong, but I’m seeing sellers doing some of this basic work. Let’s get the house cleaned, let’s do some painting, let’s get the house staged to make sure it’s as the most attractive it can be. Are you seeing that the sellers are doing a few more things in preparation for getting the house listed these days?

Megan Landry
Well, hopefully the sellers have an agent that’s educating them properly, because yes, I think at the beginning their thought process right away is, oh my god, we can get a boatload of money for our property. But we’re not in that market anymore; we’re not in it, so pricing correctly is more important than ever, and the days of throwing a number at the wall and expecting multiple offers are really behind us. So, again, like presentation and marketing and pricing are what is going to drive the results. So, I think at the end of the day, the agent really needs to be educating the seller and what expectations and negotiation, the more incentives are really starting to pop up now as well, so where they haven’t been in the past few years, so now it’s you do have to do the extra work and put in some elbow grease to make sure your your lawn is has nice curb appeal and and painting and going the extra mile, then before you really didn’t have to do that, you could have just chucked the home up on the market and it would have filled.

<strong>New Home Construction and Market Trends</strong>

Dan Ahlstrand
How about new homes, newer homes? We hear that there’s a lot of construction that are happening in HRM, a lot of it is his apartments, a lot of it is is high-rise construction, and there’s a lack of, of kind of those, those semi-detached, or those, those smaller, newer homes. What are you seeing in the market when it comes to homes that are under five years old?

Megan Landry
I mean, I work with a great builder right now, so Nate’s instructions at home by Highgate, but I will say the builders are becoming more competitive. There’s a lot of developers out there that are building throughout HRM and beyond, but we’re seeing incentives come back to the market, like I mentioned, and buyers can negotiate on items like appliances and landscaping or upgrades and things like that, and new construction continues to play like an important role in addressing housing supply, but it is still hard to find something that is affordable. So, trying to find that right builder is important, who is going to build a home right and keep it in your budget.

Clinton Wilkins
Can builders build a house in that $500,000 price point? Like, is that possible?

Megan Landry
Yes, we can do that.

Clinton Wilkins
Love it. Love it. What I think? That I think that’s music to a lot of first-time homebuyers’ ears, because I think over the five years, Megan, first-time homebuyers, we were saying we’re buying homes that were their dream homes, really, like, granite countertops, stainless steel appliances, new construction, but I would say the last couple of years they’ve had to go buy, the semi in Dartmouth, Cole Harbor, Sackville, that needs to be renovated or the bungalow that was Nan and Pops. They’ve had to buy that type of real estate just to be able to get into the marketplace, but I think it’s encouraging, saying that maybe we can get new construction that is in an affordable price point, like 600,000.

Megan Landry
I do say that to an extent, like obviously you can’t really buy land downtown Hall effect on the peninsula and build. So you have to know that the location is going, you win some, and you lose some. You have to take and give, and know what your needs are. What you’re able to be flexible with. So, if you want a brand new construction home, well, maybe you have to go outside HRM and find a nice little piece of land and start building there. And your first home is never your forever home, right?

Clinton Wilkins
I think it’s getting into the marketplace. It is so key, and I think that’s what people forget. And I think a lot of people stayed on the sidelines the last six years, whether it was mortgage interest rates, property values – they think things are going to go down. And I always say the best time to buy was yesterday.

Megan Landry
Exactly. Yeah, it’s really whenever you’re ready, like there’s never a perfect time to buy real estate. The right time is when it makes sense for you, your finances, your lifestyle.

Clinton Wilkins
100% agree.

Dan Ahlstrand
How much available land is out there? And I understand that you’re probably not going to get a lot in on the peninsula. If you do, it’s going to cost you a fortune, but for somebody that is looking to build maybe their first home, or maybe that second one for a little extra space for the kids, are there a lot of options available if you want to go through the process and build one instead of buy one?

<strong>Location and Affordability</strong>

Megan Landry
Yeah, I mean, I don’t know the stats of vacant land off the top of my head, but there are definitely options around there. But obviously, do your due diligence and really walk the land, making sure that there are homes nearby, are they on well, are they on municipal? Right, so there are definitely options there, and different price points. How, like, do you want over an acre? Are you okay with a smaller lot? So it’s really subjective, and I guess whatever the client’s looking for, but there are options for sure. There’s always vacant land out there.

Clinton Wilkins
From a location perspective, and I’m even talking about new home construction, I’m just talking about an HRM. You need to buy a place. What do you think is the best kept secret? Like, where are people sleeping these days?

Megan Landry
See, I would have said Dartmouth not long ago in Spryfield.

Clinton Wilkins
I feel like Dartmouth’s so hot.

Megan Landry
Dartmouth is so hot. I recently bought a home in Dartmouth, and I’ll say I never thought I would, and I would buy another one in a heartbeat. I loved the community and the central nest of everything. Yeah, I would still say probably Dartmouth or Spryfield.

Clinton Wilkins
I’ve heard that a lot, and people keep on bringing up Armdale. I lived in Armdale before, and I’m like, okay, it’s so close to downtown, great price point, maybe not as many homes for sale in Armdale as there maybe are in Dartmouth.

Megan Landry
Not as many homes, and I feel like people can raise their price a little bit over there, just because of the location and how central it is.

Clinton Wilkins
Now we used to see a lot of first-time home buyers buying in Dartmouth, and I think that’s really slowed, but they’re going on, maybe further; like even Cole Harbour is very expensive, but they always say, okay, Sackville, that was kind of the last place in HRM where maybe it was still affordable. But I would say everywhere has little pockets where it’s more affordable, more expensive, but I think it’s really interesting for me. I see so many clients in Dartmouth; that’s really where my business has been the last almost 20 years. And we really are there and supporting the community, so I think that’s interesting, and we love doing business in Dartmouth.

Megan Landry
It’s like we’re starting to see people go to the outskirts more, like Elmsdale and Lance and things like that, because it’s just right off the highway, so you’re still, you’re still in a good location; you can just pop on the highway and get back to town. So it’s not that far out, so we’re starting to see a lot of that happen as well, and it is more for affordable over there as well.

Dan Ahlstrand
I know this might be a loaded question, but what kind of timelines are we talking about? Are you, are you closing quickly, or now that there aren’t these bidding wars that are going on?

Megan Landry
I mean, it depends on, I guess, the seller in the situation. We’re still seeing homes close quickly. I feel like if a buyer is offering, there’s intention behind it, and no one’s really trying to wait months and months and months to get into their new home. So, I feel like if any seller is putting their home on the market, they need to expect that it’s going to be somewhat of a quicker closing. So, I think we’re starting to see a bit of both. New construction-wise, there’s a bit of flexibility there, whereas if they’re getting a home under 550,000, well, you have to be on it; it’s on the market, they’re ready to move, and so yeah, I guess a little bit of both.

Clinton Wilkins
Yeah, and I think that at one point we were just seeing these like crazy quick closes; it was like 10 days, two weeks, three weeks, where it put a strain on everyone, it put a strain on realtors and inspectors and lawyers and mortgage brokers; everyone was strained kind of by that, the short time frames. I would say maybe even before it got really busy, maybe the average was like 60 days. I think maybe it’s somewhere in the middle right now, and, and there’s something really, I think, to be said about having that balance.

Megan Landry
Yeah, exactly. And I think, given the amount of inventory we’re seeing kind of sit on the market, it gives people chances again to negotiate. So, I mean, a seller might want to close, say, next month, but maybe the buyer isn’t ready to close until the end of August, and so that’s still something that you can now chat about, so it’s a nice balanced market. I really like the market that we’re in right now.