“I think your statement suggesting that bears do not own property is is false.”

Then I haven’t been clear in conveying what I intended to convey.

I wasn’t intending to suggest that only someone who doesn’t own property could be “bearish.” What I meant to convey is that falling prices are not “depressing” for everyone, and for some, they bring back some hope that they may also own a home some day.

I think your statement suggesting that bears do not own property is is false. I’m bearish and I own property in Saskatoon.

L.oki

Saskatoon had a good boom, I was bullish and sold when I saw the opportunity. However, a bull run can’t go on forever. I am certainly not bullish (I mean not full of it) to run with the herd that goes off the cliff.

Domesticate = herd follower

“The turn down in housing starts this year is deceptive, because we are comparing this year’s numbers with 2008, which was one of the strongest years on record,” said Paul Caton, senior market analyst with CMHC.

Tell that to a home builder.

Saskatoon housing starts down 88% from 2008.

“Bear camp is depressing.”

It’s not quite as depressing if you don’t own a home and would like to.

Here’s something we haven’t seen in awhile.

Canada adds 36,000 jobs in April.

http://tinyurl.com/r3xx3v

“But bears…they just end up scaring everyone.”

I take it you’ve never been face to face with a bull then?

–Bear camp is depressing–

Besides, no one likes a bear If I was camping I would rather run into a squirrel or even a moose. But bears…they just end up scaring everyone.

Lets not forget that consumer confidence is a very real quantitative economic indicator. And right now what Saskatchewan has over other provinces (Jason) is just that. Consumer confidence. It also has 50$ a barrel oil (still nice profits) and full ready to spend provincial coffers. It also has a government that paid a significant portion of the debt back in the past 2 years and a federal government that is willing to match investment dollars. Luckily we have lots of money to spend for them to match.

March and April are in the graph. The blog software has a layer that covers up right side of the top post.

I posted a commodity wheat graph today showing the relationship between Saskaboom and wheat, so it got pushed down and March and April are now visible.

Graphs at http://relistings.drakeventure.com/relistings/

You make a good point about past sins, but I’m not sure that SRAR’s failure to point out, at the time, that 2007 and early 2008 were unsustainable would justify them excluding that those years were well above the norm now.

Thought this was interesting from the April 2007 release.

The question everybody is asking is “will we see even higher prices in the months ahead”? The answer is maybe. Demand dictates price and at this point in the market we have huge demand from a number of sectors. We have local buyers and investors, a high number of expats moving back to Saskatoon and area plus major demand from Alberta and British Columbia buyers, investors and speculators.

Our concern is for the first time buyers and anyone requiring affordable housing. There is immense pressure on this sector of the market place as it is in other cities that have experienced similar booms. Is this market sustainable? Only time will tell. Sustainability will be greatly influenced and created by stable permanent residents in our city and province.

By the next month, this was what concluded the release.

The question is always asked, is this market sustainable? The answer is yes, we have been long overdue for a price increase and after significant increases, we still have a substantially lower average sales price than the national average, which is over $300,000.00.

Lol.

In my opinion, they could omit the little editorial that concludes each release and just focus on the facts, but of course, the media always wants to know “why?”

I understand that there is no malicious intent but there’s a heck of a lot of “spin” that comes out of the bear camp as well and I think that Jason was rightly called on that above (sorry Jason). He may be one guy, but he’s told us that he sold the family home at the peak hoping to buy back in after a crash. He not only has an interest in a market crash but it seems that his plan is counting on it.

You guys? I made *one* deliberately satirical comment.

Dana said: “2007 and 2008 were wildly anomolous years. Anyone who knows anything about statistics knows that making comparisons to anomolous data is meaningless … other than to highlight how anomolous those years were”

I agree with this statement. I appreciate that you did the due diligence, Norm, and checked out the facts of SRAR’s release. I agree that they have actually been mentioning 2007-2008… but the point is that they KEEP mentioning that these years were aberrations, can’t be trusted, aren’t reliable indicators, etc. The difference is that they were NOT saying those things WHILE THEY WERE HAPPENING … as Jason said, they were acting like this was the ‘new normal’ in Saskatoon, and this was simply to be expected.

The spin comes in other ways too — e.g. saying that inventory is ‘down substantially’ from the peak, which doesn’t really tell the story that there have only been three months in the last six years where inventory was higher.

I understand that SRAR has a job to do. I have said in the past that I would not want to be the person who has to write these reports, because I could not do so in such a way that pleased their proofreaders AND fit with my own ethics. I also agree that the very things that have held Saskatchewan back in the past (resource-based and agrarian economy vs. manufacturing and services) are now helping bouy us up while those latter areas collapse in North America.

My point is this, and only this: I believe that the market is still too expensive, that low interest rates are masking this and driving short-term debt acquisition by people who will not be able to afford the carrying costs when rates (inevitably) climb, and that this will cause ANOTHER reset and wave of economic troubles — both locally and nationally. I understand that SRAR is only ‘doing what it does’ when it encourages people to buy bigger and better houses, but from the above perspective I don’t consider it to be healthy for the population as a whole, so in general I rail against it wherever I can.

In general, I don’t like ’spin’, or people who advance their own agenda with no concern for the long term health of the other guy. I prefer facts, compassion, and win-win situations… which is why I like your site, Norm. The information is here, and people can make up their own mind. Thank you.

BoC has done a great job of keeping the house market afloat this long, Saskatoon RE remains overvalued and unaffordable. (although prices are down YOY thank goodness) Great for me who will be tying in for 5 years @ 3.59%… not good for those lacking foresight as to what they can afford come “the reckoning”. That being said I do believe SK’s economy will fare the best over the next couple years.

Side note: There were sure a LOT of RE listings for May 4th, 5th, and 6th on Point2 – wowzah! Trend or anomaly? Hmmm.

That being said, there’s some real negativity towards Saskatoon here lately. I wouldn’t be so confident on Saskatoon’s real estate collapse or “overvalue”. I came here because I saw the massive opportunity at a time when most didn’t. There’s always safe harbours during times of financial crisis and I think Saskatchewan is one of them. We’ll probably see some effects from the next bear move starting this summer but I wouldn’t be anywhere else right now.

“Investin’ is hard work.”

You could always let someone else do it for you

until we have a monetary system that is not based on credit anyplace that does well like Sask,will get the credit they want. Any other time in which this province was a 0 or 1% growth, there would not be much confidence. But comparing ourselves to rest of the world, things are not too bad here. That is why there is confidence here.

I won’t disagree that we were late to the housing bubble, but prices have come down and rates are at all time lows. Whether the rates put people into the mother of all ARM’s remains to be seen. ( I don’t think so)

http://www.normfisher.ca/images/teamblog/condo_0409.jpg

This is expected, in fact, it should be going down faster. There are many similar condos on the market right now. Many have been there for quite some time. But for reason unknown, none of these condos seem willing to decrease their prices to undercut the competition! For a place with so many low quality condos, the prices here are just plain unreasonable!

OPTIMISM

EXCITEMENT

THRILL (WOW. I FEEL GREAT ABOUT THIS INVESTMENT) EUPHORIA (POINT OF MAXIMUM RISK)

ANXIETY

DENIAL (TEMPORARY SETBACK. I’M A LONG TERM INVESTOR)

FEAR

DESPERATION

PANIC

CAPITULATION (MAYBE THIS MARKET JUST IS’NT FOR ME)

DESPONDENCY

DEPRESSION (POINT OF MAXIMUM FINANCIAL OPPORTUNITY)

HOPE

RELIEF

OPTIMISM

If we are at the denial stage we have quite a way to go and so do prices. “IF”

As for condos, do you think were at the fear stage.

“I will say that SRAR does put a bit of spin on media releases”

I wouldn’t suggest otherwise, and I’ve said as much myself on several occasions. My points were that they don’t have a “secret agenda,” that their bias should be clear and expected, and that occasionally, the pot does call the kettle black.

A market comparison of 1,748 listings in September 2008 with the current inventory of 1,499 is intended to sound good, but where are the comparisons with inventory in May 2005, 2006, 2007 and 2008? How about just 2005-2006 then? One bad month of sales and excitable sellers will easily rectify that…

And I’m not sure lumping all sales in the $450-$750k range to give the impression that there is still a lot of demand for high-end homes is accurate either when, in reality, only 5 houses over $550k changed hands. 8% of the market, a 2-year supply yet it accounted for just 1.4% of sales.

Even though sales are lower than last year, they might be more impressive because of all the economic turmoil throughout the world. I won’t lie, last fall I thought it could have been real estate armageddon here this spring. Credit and confidence, the two things needed for any market is alive and well here.

I will say that SRAR does put a bit of spin on media releases but I don’t blame them at all. One just has to walk in their shoes.

“SRAR media releases…”

Frankly, I think these are points worth making. Do you think it’s actually balanced and fair to present unit sales over the past year as being in the tank? You’d be hard pressed to come up with a better example of “spin” if you wanted to present that view.

http://www.normfisher.ca/images/teamblog/salesbymonth0409.jpg

In my opinion, the more facts we can can bring to the discussion, the better. You guys might like it if nobody brought up the fact that sales really aren’t that bad but how is that fair or impartial?

Outside of 2007 and 2008, the Saskatoon housing market has been historically extremely stable and they are completely justified in using 2005/2006 as a means of comparison.

You said “I think the point was that certain comments have fairly selective comparisons, and the results tend to be skewed to support a particular viewpoint.”

You are completely backwards here, they make the comparisons for the exact reason of not “skewing” the numbers. Sorry, but I don’t see a hidden agenda. Now, if they have actually changed the data to make it look how they want, then that’s a different story…. And no, I have no affiliation with SRAR whatsoever…

SRAR media releases… May 2009: “Unit sales figures were ahead of 2005 and 2006.” April 2009: “Sales numbers are on par with 2005 and 2006.” March 2009: “Year to date unit sale numbers are ahead of 2005 and 2006 sale figures.” January 2009: “Unit sales are on par with 2007 and ahead of 2005 and 2006.” December 2008: “The 2008 year to date unit sales number is up 2% measured against 2006 when 3,276 residential units sold. When 2008 sales numbers are compared to 2005, unit sales are up 15% when year to date number stood at 2,861 units sold.”

I think the point was that certain comments have fairly selective comparisons, and the results tend to be skewed to support a particular viewpoint.