“Another month has passed where we have seen surprisingly high sales numbers – which included quite a few higher end properties,” says Victoria Real Estate Board President Sandi-Jo Ayers. “I don’t think that anyone who was trying to predict market outcomes in our area over the course of the pandemic expected that the pent up demand from dampened sales in April and May would result in this level of market activity. There’s no doubt that buyers are extremely motivated and this increased demand, coupled with limited inventory, fueled the September market.”

“Once again we saw a very active month in terms of property transactions,” says Victoria Real Estate Board President Sandi-Jo Ayers. “And once again I will note that this is not a trend, but that this is our market at this moment in time during a unique situation. It is a challenging time to define what is happening in the market given so many factors that don’t exist in a normal year. We have been surprised by the pace of the summer market and are grappling with the evolving socio-economic effects of the pandemic and how these underlying factors will influence our fall real estate market.”

“If we look at the numbers alone, June and July were unseasonably busy months and the number of sales this month are on the higher end of our market for a typical July,” says Victoria Real Estate Board President Sandi-Jo Ayers. “But we are not in a typical season. We cannot derive an ongoing trend nor forecast by looking at the activity because we know the market is subjected to unusual factors amidst a health crisis. Our spring market was delayed because of the pandemic. It is likely that our spring demand moved into summer now that folks are moving around our community more freely. Time will tell if these factors are resulting in a very compressed cycle of activity or if this trend will persist in the fall.”