Home prices in Vancouver hit million-dollar landmark

CTV.ca News Staff
Vancouver's super-hot real estate market has hit an expensive milestone, with the average price of a home reaching $1 million for the first time.
More than 1,300 single detached homes were sold in greater Vancouver last month, for a whopping total of $1.35 billion.
That puts the average sale price tag for a home at slightly more than $1 million -- an achievement that the B.C. Real Estate Association says is unprecedented.
"It was the first month ever we saw that price crest a million dollars," said Cameron Muir, the association's chief economist.
The $1-million average includes high-end homes. But the average price for a single, standard detached home in the city reached $800,341, the Real Estate Board of Greater Vancouver said Tuesday. That's up from $650,000 a year ago.
The soaring prices have local realtors like Paul Eviston feeling good.
"If you look at our market in the last 12 months, (it's) probably the hottest real estate market in the world," he said.
Local housing prices jumped 23 per cent in March compared to a year earlier, according to the city's real estate board. The recovery means housing prices in Vancouver are now 3 per cent higher than they were before the recession hit.
It's the market's strongest rebound in 40 years, Muir said.
Housing prices are recovering in other Canadian cities, but not at the same pace as Vancouver.
Eviston said the city is leading the way for a few reasons.
"You can attribute a lot of that to the Olympics, and you can't underestimate how weather affects peoples' buying patterns," he said. "That's a huge part of it, and we had a very mild winter."