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In this video we’ll look at the top real estate and housing trends for 2019, from the product side to the financing side. That’s starting right now. Welcome to Home Buyers School, Brought to you by Brookfield Residential. Hi everyone, I’m Karl, welcome to another Home Buyer School video. A channel where you get the latest strategies tactics and tips from home buying experts. And remember if this is your first time on this channel and you want to get the latest strategies from the experts hit the subscription button below. Hit the little notification bell so you don’t miss anything. So today I’m joined by Kevin French, a realtor with RE/MAX realty, and today the question we’re gonna answer is, what are some of the housing and real estate trends for 2019? So Kevin maybe we start this off with in terms of maybe interest rates and mortgage rates. What are you seeing in terms of the direction in 2019 and beyond? Affordability is a pretty big issue.

I think the major concern is that when the government makes decisions, they make them federally, so it’s across the country so we’re trying to band-aid or fix concerns over the Vancouver and Toronto market, specifically, and then those new rules apply as a blanket to the entire country. The stress test is obviously slowed

down the market overall. A lot less buyers in the market. People are then weighing well if I could afford 400 and now I can only afford 300 maybe I’ll just keep renting because I don’t get what I want.

And then there’s speculation that they’re going to change the mortgage rules to be in the favor of the buyers maybe that’s from a 25-year amortization to a 30-year or maybe it’s assisting with the downpayment in some way and that would make it so that more buy – buyers could potentially afford more or be more comfortable purchasing but those aren’t set in stone yet so because it’s in the unknown there’s a few handful buyers that are waiting on the sidelines. And we also saw in the budget the the first time homebuyer incentive as well as the I think the increase in amount you can take out from your RRSPs as well right so those kind of things are… And that’s withdrawing RRSPs for your first time home purchase. They are taxes so you don’t have to pay taxes on the withdraw but you do have to pay it back within 15 years, unless things have changed or they’re planning on adjusting that so it’s a way to you know expedite your down payment if you did have that money set aside for retirement and get you into a property sooner. Increases and that would obviously make it so that your mortgage payments would go down you’d have more equity in the property from day one.

Let’s just move from finance to actual product types. For example in my neighbourhood I’m starting to see a lot of duplexes starting to be put up. It’s like single-family torn down, duplex comes up or duplex, duplex, duplex, duplex is that something that’s a trend generally or is it more just because it’s a neighborhood or…. This must be inner-city? So that’s infill development which is ever throughout everywhere in inner city. That’s basically the city turning a 50-foot lot into two homes or maybe four if they can fit a four-plex on there, that’s increasing density and in Calgary there’s great opportunity for small developers or large developers if they’re working in the infill game that they can purchase a property and then build to and make profit out of it. That’s probably the biggest increase or a reason why there’s an increase in

infills and while there’s a demand for them but it also gives buyers the opportunity to purchase a brand new property that is in the area that they want and if it’s duplex typically more affordable for them as well.

If you’re going if other trends within what’s being built is secondary suites or the ability to have a revenue helper whether it’s a mother-in-law suite or a family member is going to live there we’re seeing a change in the city’s development permits. So in new areas they’re handing out new zoning and new regulations that allow for that to be legally included and then the builders are building that and then of course that gives the person the opportunity to live on the second the first and second level and then have somebody else live in the basement and rent it out completely legally. Is there popularity of a specific home type? Is there something bucking the trend or is it still single-family homes? You know there’s the city and people like increasing density so in terms of multi families, or is it still single-family still the big driver in the market? If price point didn’t matter it would be single-family. Since it does it drive some single-family purchasers in a duplex. Single-family has weathered the storm the best so it’s still the best purchase overall. I don’t think that we’re gonna see this shift for a longer period a much longer period of time of the needs of the Millennials or other generations needing a different lifestyle in terms of condo living.

I think we’ll see a shift in needing less space so not needing a 2,400 square foot duplex over three levels and for two people or for three people or for four people. That’s a that’s a lot of square footage so there’s a handful of people that have sold homes with me in the last year that have sold their home simply because it’s just too much space. They don’t go into this room they’ll go into that room we barely go into the basement so why do we have this.

They’re downsizing and they’re in their 30s. So it’s not like your typical downsize or it’s like I need to reduce because all my children have left, it’s like I don’t need to use every single room so why do I need to…

And with that they’re often decreased in their mortgage. In your opinion then is 2019 is still a game this may be a loaded question but it’s 2019 a good year to buy a home? It’s an excellent year to buy a home. I’ve been hesitant in saying that it’s a good year to buy a home for the last four years. I’m more confident in it now because you know the Calgary real estate board puts out statistics every year and they make predictions on what’s going to happen and the following year and those predictions are pretty accurate. This year I believe it’s 2.4% decrease in home prices. That was expected to be seen in the first half of the year more so than the last half of the year. Now that we’ve had the election of course that has impacted things it’s kind of hard to pinpoint it because we just had the spring market or we’re in the middle of the spring market at the same time as having the election in the new control so there’s the market is extremely busy right now.

Is it because it’s Spring? Is it because of the change? But it’s speculation is that’s given a lot more confidence to the market overall And how about like there’s a spring market and is there’s a fall market right? What are your expectations in terms of the fall market? Do you feel like there’s like a steady increase like in terms of buyers or are we still in that market where

people are still hesitant? It’s you’re probably similar to the spring people will be a bit hesitant still. There’s still a lot of people that are trying to time the market and see where the bottom is and then and then purchased then. There’s been a lot less conversation though now in 2019 about doing that then there has been in the last three years. The last three years it’s I think it might go down in the next six months I’m gonna wait I think it might go down. The reality is, the amount that Calgary has continued to decrease and while you talk specifically to the detached side, the
amount that the markets continued to decrease.

If you were renting a comparable home, you would still be better off to purchase. If you purchased in 2015 – 18 that detached home that’s 2,000 square feet say the cost to rent that property and then what you’d be paying in a mortgage and building in equity the offsets pretty much the same so you might as well just get the property you want cuz once it turns around you’ll be gaining equity. Nice if you can time it perfectly. Which I don’t think anyone can because there’s always another bottle right And remember if you want to know more about the advantages of owning versus renting, check out her video above in the description below. So Kevin did you have anything else add in terms of housing transferred 2019? I would just encourage people to purchase what they can afford and not what they think they need within your means and buy the property that’s the right size for you. Don’t overspend and buy a place with three bedrooms that you’ll never enter. and if you want to know more about home buying and the home buying process, watch these videos here and don’t forget to hit the subscribe button and the notification bell, to keep learning from the experts.

Thanks for watching and we’ll catch you in our next video! .

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