{"id":1730,"date":"2024-02-07T09:26:56","date_gmt":"2024-02-07T16:26:56","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.century21yk.ca\/blog\/?p=1730"},"modified":"2024-03-04T13:49:27","modified_gmt":"2024-03-04T20:49:27","slug":"cmhc-has-some-things-to-say-about-our-housing-market","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.century21yk.ca\/blog\/2024\/02\/cmhc-has-some-things-to-say-about-our-housing-market\/","title":{"rendered":"CMHC Has Some Things to Say About our Housing Market"},"content":{"rendered":"

\"\"<\/a>The Canada Mortgage and Housing Corporation released its 2023 Northern Housing Report<\/a> just over a week ago and, as always, it gave us some interesting insights into where the Yellowknife real estate market is headed.\u00a0 One challenge with these annual reports is that many of the statistics are more than a year old by the time the report is published, but we can supplement its findings with other information that is readily available in the marketplace.<\/p>\n

Here are some key themes from the report:<\/p>\n

Relief for Renters is on the Way<\/strong><\/p>\n

Despite the fact that there were no new rental developments completed in 2022,\u00a0 the vacancy rate doubled to 3.5% in 2022, which represents 70 vacant apartments and townhomes.\u00a0 This is good news for renters, and more good news is on the way because we now have between 170 and 240 apartments under construction, which will increase the stock of rental apartments by 10% to 14% in 2024.\u00a0 Does this mean the vacancy rate will shoot up to the high teens?\u00a0 It depends how much pent-up demand there is in the marketplace.\u00a0 How many “fly-in-fly-out” workers will put down roots instead of continuing their bi-monthly commute, and how many households are overfilled, with residents prepared to move out to fill the vacancies?\u00a0 Impossible to know, but it will be interesting to watch.<\/p>\n

Residential Construction was Down 21%<\/strong><\/p>\n

This isn’t much of a surprise given that for the last couple of years there has been no new residential land for sale in Yellowknife.\u00a0 The interesting question is, if there were land for sale, would our population be growing faster than it is now?\u00a0 Does housing in Yellowknife work on a “build it and they will come” basis?\u00a0 I think it does to a large degree.\u00a0 It wasn’t that long ago that many locals questioned the likelihood of a couple hundred units at Lakeshore and Summit Developments finding buyers, just given that we have been in a prolonged period of slow but steady GDP decline.\u00a0 With few new jobs, what could drive population growth? But they certainly did sell out – our population grew to absorb the new units, and we quickly returned to what seems like a perennial housing shortage situation.\u00a0 It’s impossible to say why this happens, but the “pent up demand” argument above could certainly seem to apply to home ownership just as much as to home rentals.<\/p>\n

Build it and They Will Stay?<\/strong><\/p>\n

The third factor in the pent-up demand equation, besides fly-in-fly-out workers and over-filled housing, is retirees.\u00a0 CMHC found that, “older people continue to account for an increasing share of Yellowknife\u2019s population. The population that is 60 years and older now makes up 13.4% of the population. That\u2019s more than double the share this group accounted for in 2010.”<\/p>\n

As has been well reported, the huge baby boom demographic is leading to a similar population shift right across the country.\u00a0 But the question, is if we had better housing options – or even just more housing options – for seniors, both of the high density (apartments) and low-density (patio homes and bungalows) varieties, would even more people choose to stay here in retirement?\u00a0 Again, I think the answer is yes.\u00a0 I have no way to prove this theory, but our team members hear from lots of outgoing residents that they would have stayed if they could have found the type of housing they are looking for in retirement.\u00a0 It also doesn’t take much more that a quick drive around town to see that we don’t have much in the way of the type of housing that seniors look for in other cities.<\/p>\n

Why Does Any of This Matter to Yellowknife Property Owners?<\/strong><\/p>\n

The key takeaways for me are that demand for single family homes and townhomes will remain very strong – because we have no vacant land available to build new units.\u00a0 But demand for condominium apartments could soften over the next two years, because a lot of new apartments are coming down the pike.<\/p>\n

We’re committed to providing value to our clients in as many ways as possible, and one of those ways is through consumer education.\u00a0\u00a0If you find these posts valuable, please take a moment to leave us a Google Review by following this link: https:\/\/g.page\/r\/Cf_LTIUkVkX6EBM\/review.<\/a>\u00a0 Ours is a business based on referrals, and every bit helps.\u00a0 Thank you!<\/em><\/p>\n

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 <\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

The Canada Mortgage and Housing Corporation released its 2023 Northern Housing Report just over a week ago and, as always, it gave us some interesting insights into where the Yellowknife real estate market is headed.\u00a0 …<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":3,"featured_media":1689,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_monsterinsights_skip_tracking":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_active":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_note":"","_monsterinsights_sitenote_category":0,"footnotes":""},"categories":[62,54],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-1730","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-for-renters","category-market-analysis"],"aioseo_notices":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.century21yk.ca\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1730"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.century21yk.ca\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.century21yk.ca\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.century21yk.ca\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/3"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.century21yk.ca\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=1730"}],"version-history":[{"count":15,"href":"https:\/\/www.century21yk.ca\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1730\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":1826,"href":"https:\/\/www.century21yk.ca\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1730\/revisions\/1826"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.century21yk.ca\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/1689"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.century21yk.ca\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=1730"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.century21yk.ca\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=1730"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.century21yk.ca\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=1730"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}