Hi, I would like to respond to some very valid questions I have received in response to my article earlier regarding how we will handle our business during the Covid-19 crisis. I personally believe that we would be well served to not only do physical distancing (and quarantine for some of us!) but to have a complete lock down of our country right now (other than essential serv ...

I thought I would provide some information about how Covid-19 is being addressed in our real estate business. I have just returned from repatriating my children from Nicaragua to Canada and am now in self isolation for 2 weeks.  Obviously, concern over the spread of the Covid-19 AND it's impact on absolutely everything is very real and cannot be ignored.  While we hope the world continues on ...

January has started off the year with a bang.  Home sales activity (not to be confused with prices) is WAY up as compared to last January. Sales were up a whopping 42.4 percent from where they were in January 2019 and 22.1 percent from December 2019. The number of homes for sale in January was 20.1 percent LESS than last January-a good thing for sellers. The number of listings this past Janu ...

Assessed Value vs. Market Value:  Don’t Panic-they are NOT the same! Every year around this time, I receive calls from people asking what their property assessments mean. This year, because most assessments have decreased A LOT, I am receiving even more calls than usual. I am more than happy to discuss particular circumstances (read: talk people off the ledge!) however for the benefit of tho ...

Sales up....Prices are not...BUT things have improved for sellers!   Over the last few months, we have seen a dramatic improvement in the market. Homes that had been sitting for quite some time suddenly sold; new listings are also selling very quickly in many cases. Recently, we had 3 homes sell after the first weekend: 2 at OVER ASKING and one at FULL PRICE. None of these homes were priced ...

October was a great month (relatively speaking) for real estate.  After months of sales below the 10 year average, the last few months have been gradually improving and in October the sales for the region were finally above the 10 year October average. When compared to last October, sales were up over 45%  and sales were up 9.8% over the 10 year average.  That is a significant improvement. ...

Sales are up...prices are not...   Over the last few months, we have seen a dramatic improvement in the market.  Homes that had been sitting for quite some time suddenly sold; new listings were selling quickly; AND we had 3 homes sell after the first weekend-2 at OVER ASKING and one at FULL PRICE. None of these homes were priced low and all sold at much higher prices than expected. The numbe ...