Richmond Hill, Ontario, covers 3 districts in the Toronto MLS® system. These are N03, N04 and N05. The boundaries of Richmond Hill are Highway 7 in the South, Bloomington Road in the North, Highway 404 to the East and 
Bathurst Street to the West.
Bathurst Street to the West. The N03 district is everything South of Major Mackenzie Dr., N04 is between Major Mackenzie Dr and Gamble Road and N05 is from Gamble Road to Bloomington Rd.
Richmond Hill's N05 district includes Oak Ridges.
The number of homes for sale in Richmond Hill has increased in the past few months and at the same time the number of sales has decrease slightly. This is in line with the expectations of a balancing market. It is expected that housing prices will level off and sales volume will moderate. There seems to be a large portion of home sellers that are still looking for a 5%, plus, price increase over last year. 
This is a bit of a concern as the average sale price has only increased around 3% since last year and in some types of homes it may be more accurate to have a 2% increase in prices. If these Richmond Hill home sellers do not adjust to today's markets then there will be more expired listings and potentially a flooded market, causing decreases in home prices, if they have to sell due to prior commitments.The overall picture for the Richmond Hill real estate markets is that of a balanced market that is very close to edging into the "buyer's market" category.
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2 comments:
Wow...Richmond Hill is hurting. Oct 2005 the average sales price of a detached was $503,314, Oct 2006 it is $436,960. That is a 13% drop not taking into account inflation! Who says there is no real estate bubble!
Hi Angelo,
It is true that the average home price for detached homes did drop significantly in the month of September (October 2006 numbers have not officially been released yet). However, believing that this is a signal of a bubble is to fall into the "statistics trap". There were only about 50 detached homes sold in each of the three districts that cover Richmond Hill. If there were a couple of million dollar sales last year and none this year that would greatly effect the average sale price. The shortage of higher priced housing sales may only be a reflection of which buyers were ready to buy and which were not.
The reality is that for a specific type, size and style of home the prices have still gone up, but only a little. There is a possibility for decreased prices if a large majority of the home sellers, that are currently on the market, have to sell and do not just want to sell. For if they have to sell and they get close to their deadline then they will have to lower prices to stimulate activity and offers.
So, I still believe that their is no "Bubble" however, we are seeing a slowdown or normalization of the real estate markets. That said we are not looking at having large increases in prices over the next few years and if sellers keep trying to get 5% or more, year over year then they may set themselves up for a future downfall.
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