JOSH BUCHANAN May 12, 2024 Recently, I’ve been claiming that home prices will be on the rise this summer. The main reason for this is because the housing market is very under-supplied at the moment. Almost without exception, home prices get pushed up when there is a supply shortage. Here’s what is currently happening and will continue to happen this summer: -The number of prospective buyers relative to sellers is imbalanced -When there are more buyers than sellers, the market becomes competitive -When you have multiple people interested in buying one property, they often get into bidding wars ..read more

JOSH BUCHANAN May 12, 2024 The title is just click bait. I don’t think we should do anything to the Meewasin trail, but I think some people are easily triggered by the idea of change in any form. In a recent post, I talked about several areas in the city that seemed poorly utilized and mentioned the Meewasin Valley area is one of them. To clarify, I didn’t mean the trail area itself, I said “a small section of land behind the university that could be converted to student housing” and just had the Meewasin Trail as the title because that was the general area I was talking about. I just mean the ..read more

JOSH BUCHANAN May 12, 2024 When the housing market is really competitive and prices are rising, there tends to be more building of multi-unit residential properties like apartments, attached townhouses, and detached houses with basement suites. When the market is less competitive and prices aren’t rising, the focus of building tends to be more on single-family houses. This is why there has been so much building of multi-unit dwellings over the past 15 years or so. Whereas from the late 1980s to the mid 2000s, there was much less – especially in the late 1980s and early 1990s. The initial build ..read more

JOSH BUCHANAN May 11, 2024 In one of my recent posts, I pointed out some spots in the city that I had questions about because they seemed to be very poorly utilized. Suitable utilization of property is more important these days as we’re currently witnessing the worst housing shortage since a short stint in 2007, and probably the second-worst shortage in at least 40 years. Here are some more spots that seem to be poorly utilized: 1. 14th Street and Cumberland Avenue For the most part, I think it’s good to have this open space and not make things too crowded. I also do see this park get used on ..read more

JOSH BUCHANAN May 11, 2024 As Saskatoon’s housing market faces major shortages, there is upward pressure on prices, both on homes for sale and on the rental market. Obviously, seeing home prices rise and rental rates rise, in addition to a lack of options is really challenging for those looking to rent or buy. In response to this, I think many people feel that there should be more rent controls in place. I understand the thinking behind it and thought I would give my take on it. It has been 8.5 years since I worked as a property manager so I don’t remember all of the rules around rent control ..read more

JOSH BUCHANAN May 10, 2024 Recently, I’ve been saying that Saskatoon’s housing market is very seriously under-supplied. The downside of making my opinions public is that I get criticism and people try to argue with me. The nice thing about that is, those criticisms often lead to more research on my part, followed by more blog post ideas and content. So, I thought I would use this opportunity to explain why I describe Saskatoon’s housing market as being seriously or severely under-supplied right now. There are three main ways in which I conclude this: 1) comparing the current market to historic ..read more

JOSH BUCHANAN May 9, 2024 Based on the housing stats at the end of April, Saskatoon needs roughly 1,250 more residential properties to be added to the current inventory of homes for sale in order to balance the market out. Keep in mind, the number is likely higher than this as there would be even more sales if active inventory was higher. There are plenty of prospective buyers who are being outbid on properties or have simply given up on trying to purchase because the market is too competitive. That said, Saskatoon probably needs approximately 1,500 more residential properties for sale, immedi ..read more

JOSH BUCHANAN May 6, 2024 CBC Radio’s Saskatoon morning show hosted residential Realtor Megan Shpyth and Analyst/Blogger Josh Buchanan of the Saskatoon Real Estate Economics Blog regarding the current competitive state of the market. Have a listen! The original CBC post can be found here: https://www.cbc.ca/listen/live-radio/1-88-saskatoon-morning/clip/16063448-realtor-says-shrinking-housing-market-forces-people-strategize — Please support the blog by subscribing, sharing, commenting, sending an email or donation to jcb8485@gmail.com ..read more

JOSH BUCHANAN May 4, 2024 Since starting the blog in 2015, my main focus has been analyzing the state of the market and to understand what’s happening, why it’s happening and what it means going forward. The best way to analyze how home values should be behaving is simply by observing supply and demand. On a macro level, the housing market is highly influenced by central planners like the federal government and central banks. However, on a micro-level, it is a fairly free market in terms of behaviour of buyers and sellers. Because of this, supply and demand play a huge role in the value of hom ..read more

JOSH BUCHANAN May 3, 2024 Once in a while, I create a question and answer post addressing the current state of the market. Here are my current thoughts on the market in response to common questions: For starters, if you don’t understand any of the terminology or ratios used here, go back and read my other 302 posts and learn the basics. I don’t like re-explaining every single concept in every single post. What does it mean that the market is the most competitive since 2007? By competitive, I mean many buyers with few homes available. It’s like the Bachelor or Bachelorette show (not that I ever ..read more