Canadian Housing Market's Confidence Crisis

[00:00:00] Welcome to The Canadian Real Estate Investor, where hosts Daniel Foch and Nick Hill navigate the market and provide the tools and insights to build your real estate portfolio. There's something truly sobering about the March 2025 CREA statistics. The industry has tried to sustain its hallmark optimism against a barrage of negativity that we're seeing in the economy.

[00:00:26] For months now, we've been whispering about uncertainty, about tariffs, interest rate decisions, macroeconomic jitters. But March 2025 did not whisper. It shouted. And what it revealed wasn't just that the housing market is still kind of on that pause button that we've talked about so much,

[00:00:50] but one beginning to crack under the weight of something deeper. And unfortunately, that looks like eroding buyer confidence. If you're wondering why we're using March stats, by the way, Canadian Real Estate Association stats come out on the 15th of every month. So, April stats will be out on May 15th. We'll cover those as soon as we do. This is typically the same episode we do at the end of this.

[00:01:16] We're going to have a hearing from our meetup host. So, we'll go through Canadian Real Estate Association stats, which is often us just taking points from the articles that I put in Real Estate Magazine. And then we'll kind of go right into it, get a boots on the ground perspective from all of our meetup hosts across the country. So, make sure you get out to a meetup to meet those folks. Anyway, let's talk facts first. Canadian home sales dropped 4.8% in March compared to February. Typically, you see home sales rise from February into March, right? So, this is why it's also important to talk about March.

[00:01:46] March is kind of the beginning of your spring market in most markets. This is especially concerning when you see this, right? And now we're down 20%. Wow. It's the fourth month in a row that we've seen home sales dropping. Not exactly the trajectory of the rebound year that many people had hoped. And obviously, there's a lot of reasons for this, which we're going to get into. But these figures actually mark the weakest March since 2009. And let's not forget what that year represented for the global economy.

[00:02:16] Yeah, what happened back then? Something in 2008 that triggered a little something. It's- Global Financial Party is what they were calling it. Right. Global Financial Party, of course. Yeah, Sean Cathcart at CREA put it quite bluntly. I'm quoting him here. We've gone from a slam dunk rebound year to treading water at best.

[00:02:39] And that's something that if you ask anyone within the industry, I don't care if you are a top producer or someone new that is just trying to find your footing. Treading water is not something that you want to hear. Essentially, it just means we're barely hanging on for life here. I'd go a step further. We're not treading water. We're navigating an undertow. And quiet but persistent forces keep pulling at the market's very foundations.

[00:03:08] Welcome back, Canadian real estate investors. I'm Dan. I am chief real estate officer at a real estate brokerage called Valerie Real Estate, Valerie.ca. I help investors across the country through being a real estate professional, but also through our course at real estate.ca and our online community at real estate.ca. And I'm Nick, the other half of this podcast.

[00:03:31] I am a mortgage agent at owl.com, owl mortgage.ca and luckily enough to work with Dan and all of you amazing people across the country. We help finance or refinance or find debt for whatever type of project you're looking at. So if you're trying to buy a duplex on the East Coast or trying to build some missing middle housing in Edmonton or trying to refinance a condo in Vancouver, Toronto, I can help you. And I love working with people from the show.

[00:04:01] So please reach out. Dan, let's get back on track here. Tell me what is really going on here. And again, just to clarify, yes, this data is a month old, but we cover it every month. And this stuff doesn't, I mean, this stuff does happen in real time, but we can't, we can't cover it in real time. It takes time to collect this data. So that is why, just like with everything in real estate, it's kind of at least a month lag behind here.

[00:04:30] So this is the most up to date data from Korea that you're about to hear. Yeah. So what's really going on at the surface level, it's easy to blame tariffs. The cross-border tension has injected obviously a lot of volatility into sectors that were already walking a tightrope. But the slowdown is more than just policy friction. It's emotional. It's psychological.

[00:04:53] When buyers are scared, not just of interest rates or job security, but an unstable global order, they don't transact. I mean, you've seen myriad, you know, survey results that say that a lot of people are putting major purchase decisions on hold in the face of uncertainty. And so they don't transact, they sit, they wait, they second guess. Quite the powerful line there, an unstable global order.

[00:05:21] I, it's kind of scary when we put it like that, but I guess with all the elections, the trades, the tariffs, and all the other volatility we've seen in the market, it's obvious. And that fear, Dan, that we've covered numerous times as we've commented on the fear and greed index, kind of monitoring that as a, you know, the invisible hand of the market, that the sentiment. Well, you know, that fear is measurable now.

[00:05:46] Year over year, March sales were down 9.3% and prices fell too with the national average dropping 3.7%, making the average Canadian home at $678,331. That number may still feel lofty in some or even most markets across the country, but context is king here.

[00:06:10] This is the sharpest year over year price dip we've seen in some time and the largest month over month index drop since late 2023. Inventory is climbing up 18.3% from a year ago, and the sales to new listings ratio is now sitting at 45.9%. It hasn't been this low since February of 2009. It tells us something crucial. Sellers are arriving.

[00:06:38] We're seeing more and more inventory, but the buyers, not so much. Interesting. So again, we've got that disparity between sellers and buyers. What market are we in? Dan, can you, for those listening that may not be too familiar with the sales to new listings ratio metric, can you maybe elaborate on that and why that's important and why it consistently comes up in these episodes when we're going over Korea stats and trying to paint a picture of the national market here? Yeah. Yeah.

[00:07:05] So there's really two ways that you can measure whether or not we're in a buyer's market or a seller's market. The first one is months of inventory. And the second is sales to new listings ratio. Both of these are presented on a chart on the Korea stats website, stats.korea.ca, which is what we're using here. And the sales to new listings ratio is basically the number of sales in the last month divided by the number of listings, new listings in the last month. So number of properties that sold.

[00:07:34] So if, you know, if we're at 45.9%, that means if a hundred properties were listed last month, 45.9 properties sold, right? Let's say let's round it up to 46. So only 46% of the new listings or the volume of new listings are actually selling. So this tells you basically the speed at which new inventory could potentially be accumulating. So it's almost like a forward looking version of your months of inventory, whereas your months of inventory is a point in time thing.

[00:08:03] Months of inventory basically says if a hundred homes sold last month, but we have 400 homes on the market, then that means we have four months of inventory, right? Because a hundred homes are selling a month. It would take four months to clear that inventory. So that's how those are used. And those are, you know, as those go up, as months of inventory goes up, you get closer to a buyer's market. And as sales to new listings ratio goes down, you get closer to a buyer's market. Wonderful. Thank you for that.

[00:08:31] So what I'm getting from this is this is not a uniform market. And you and I have joked about over the last couple of years, okay, bull market, bear market, buyer's market, seller's market. The whole thing seems like a bit of a kangaroo market. And it's not a uniform market whatsoever. And this is what makes these episodes or even just speaking in more broader strokes, you know, painting kind of painting a picture with one brush here in Canada.

[00:08:59] It makes it really hard because Ontario and BC are typically and currently dragging national stats down with steep declines in both activity and price in those major and notoriously expensive markets. However, it is a very different story as it usually is in places like the prairies and the entire province of Quebec and its major cities.

[00:09:21] And of course, parts of Atlantic Canada, where we see prices in those markets still rising and activity on the rises as well. Yeah. Yeah. I mean, the translation here is we're seeing an emergence of two Canada's in housing and it's kind of always been this way, but it becomes really clear when two markets are going down and the rest of the markets are going up yet somehow the national stats are going down. Right. So it's a little confusing. Yeah.

[00:09:49] So one market is cautious and cooling. This is your urban high priced economically exposed markets. Really? I mean, basically Ontario and the lower mainland. Yeah. Not even Ontario. I'd say it's Southern Ontario. Yeah. Right? Yeah. Yeah. And then the other side is stable or climbing. These are your affordable, less volatile and often overlooked markets and frankly, where most of your good investments exist. Can you comment a little bit on this great chart that Cree has put out here, Dan? Sure.

[00:10:19] Maybe on front of prices. Yeah. So if you look at the Canadian average, so they have this chart that says residential average price year over year percentage change March 2025 versus March 2024. Canadian average is about negative 4%. So on average across the country, house prices have fallen about 4%. In BC, they fall in about 5%. And then Alberta went up 6%. Saskatchewan went up just over 10%. Manitoba went up 10%. Ontario fell 4%.

[00:10:48] So just keep in mind, only BC and Ontario have fallen so far. Quebec went up about 8%. New Brunswick went up about 7%. Nova Scotia went up 7%. PEI went up about 12%. And Newfoundland went up like 16%, 17%. So, and this is just, you know, one month. But the point is, you know, I mean, this divergence is more than a quirk, right? This is a structural shift.

[00:11:11] We're seeing, you know, we're moving from this sort of rising tide lifts all boats phenomena where in 2020, 2021, Ontario and BC price growth really pushed that capital up. You saw a positive wealth effect and then people would, you know, your Ontario capital was spilling out into all these other markets and destroying those markets too. You know, Calgary was a big, big beneficiary of that. Halifax, same thing. Halifax, another one, yeah. Yeah.

[00:11:37] And, you know, now local resilience and location matters more than national trends. And that means buyers and sellers need to stop obsessing over the headlines and start zooming in on these, these hyper local realities. And really, I mean, this is a really good use case for going to meetups, meeting local, you know, meetup hosts. Yeah. I took the words right out of your mouth. You took the pitch out of my mouth. I was just going to say, yeah. I mean, honestly, this is why we do this. Like I do these calls selfishly because I want to invest in Canadian cities across the country.

[00:12:06] And I want to know what's happening in those cities because I can't, I analyze this stuff more than anybody. But if I'm not on the ground talking to a local expert, there's no way I'm going to actually be successful in those markets. You can't, you can't just buy this stuff based on data. Yeah. It's man. I'm so happy you said that. And, and wow, this, this is, this is on totally by accident. This is, this literally sets us up for the perfect pitch for why we have the events and why we've designed our entire organization, Dan, between realists and the events as the national play. Right.

[00:12:36] This is why at the end of this episode, we'll have, you know, a few of our hosts come on to, to talk about what they're doing. Cause Dan, you and I are lucky enough to fly across the country and, but we're unlucky enough to both live in Southern Ontario where it is very hard to get deals done. It takes a level of sophistication and a certain level of capital. And, you know, for instance, when we were out in Edmonton last month and by the time this episode is out, we'll have come and gone back and forth to Halifax.

[00:13:01] And we'll have these conversations with, with people there being like, you know, yeah, what are you guys doing? Or they're like, how's, you know, what's investing like back in Ontario or, you know, Toronto. And we always joke about, you know, how, how, how hard it is. And of course you and I still know, and they're helping people get deals done in our, in our market. But, you know, you talk to people out in Edmonton, which is a great example and Edmonton and surrounding areas. And they are laughing, they are killing it.

[00:13:28] They are doing burrs, they're doing flips, they're doing wholesales, they're building large multifamily, they're buying and holding land. Like you name the strategy and they are executing it in these other markets. So that's why it's absolutely crucial to understand what's happening in these markets. And yes, that Ontario does lead and lag on a lot of this kind of stuff, but it's got to be taken not only with a grain of salt, but in some cases with a handful of salt,

[00:13:53] because there is not a world in which you can compare Edmonton and Toronto or Halifax and Toronto on an apples by apples basis. It's just a big salt guy myself. Actually. I like, I put salt in my coffee now, actually, you know? Yeah. Salt. Well, you're supposed to have salt water in the mornings now they're saying, I don't know, man. Health changes like all the time. Whatever, whatever's like the new. Yeah. Like, like two years ago, it was like, don't eat a carb. And now it's like, you know, it's like you need carbs for your brain to work and you shouldn't be cold plunging as much, you know?

[00:14:23] Yeah. It's like, you know, lick salt off your hand every morning. It's like, what is going on? That's for tequila shots. What am I at? A horse? Okay. So let's get back on track here. Where does this leave us? Well, we're navigating a market driven by less by the fundamentals that we teach and follow and practice. And this is where it gets dangerous more by feelings, right? The emotions have crept into the market.

[00:14:52] And right now those feelings are fragile. Buyers are hesitant. Sellers are listing, but they're second guessing every step. Unsure whether to hold on, drop prices, accept that first bid. You know, it might, it's been listed for too long, et cetera, et cetera. And of course, this depends on the asset class in your area.

[00:15:12] And with Canada officially, you know, in election mode up until basically what, like two weeks ago now or a week ago or something like that. It'll be a few weeks by the time you listen to it. And now with post-election clarity, dare I say, I don't think we have that yet. The federal government has slipped more into kind of what seems to be a bit more of a caretaker position in the last few weeks, few months.

[00:15:45] And I think that's a lot of work to do on the housing front. And I think just in general in the economy, and I think until we really start to see what that looks like in real life, in real time, how much of these real issues they're going to try to fix as soon as possible. I think that still leaves us in this kind of emotional purgatory a little bit. Yeah.

[00:16:11] I mean, you had, we've seen a couple of good pressers from Carney and it seems like they're running after some of these issues pretty quickly. Plus, so I think that, you know, layer number one of the uncertainty that we've been talking about has been removed, right? The election. We know who is leading Canada at least for the next probably two years, likely four. And we, you know, we're familiar with sort of like the policy platform and the things that they plan to do. And then Carney also went and met with Trump.

[00:16:40] So this is kind of your escalating trade tensions and this volley of tit for tat tariffs that are tightening the screws and an already fragile economic outlook for Canada, right? You know, Carney went to go meet with Trump and it sounds like he's still not getting rid of that kind of base tariff. But, you know, the relationship does seem a lot better. Like I think he, Trump just really didn't like Trudeau, to be honest. Oh, he made that pretty apparent. Yeah, he did. Very entertaining. Yeah.

[00:17:10] There's still strains in business confidence, particularly trade sensitive sectors. Consumer sentiment is similarly under pressure. You know, a lot of Canadians pulling back in major purchases. We're seeing household savings increase. People are kind of bracing for more economic uncertainty. Totally right, Dan. And even still, even in this climate of hesitation, pockets of opportunity persist. In markets where demand remains tight and inventory is still plain catch up.

[00:17:35] We're seeing price resilience, if not, in some cases, outright growth for investors and upsizers. Today's softer pricing and reduced competition may offer that little window of opportunity that we haven't seen in months and in some cases in years. And that may, again, disappear before some people have decided to act on it, right? This is for all those people that are waiting to time the market. Well, this might be that time that you can actually go and do that.

[00:18:05] If you were prepared, you built that investment thesis and you've done your due diligence, right? This is, I know, Dan, you're going to cringe when I say this, but I can't help it. Patiently impulsive, right? This is why we do all the pre-work so that when you do have these windows that you can identify, you can go and make something happen.

[00:18:22] Now, for first-time homebuyers, however, unfortunately, they're more likely to be waiting on the sidelines, hoping for this new federal government to make some meaningful changes and provide some of the support before taking that first step into the market. Dan, hit me with your kind of final take on what this means for Canada, for real estate, and what investors should be doing. And then maybe we'll hop over to our meetup host section.

[00:18:50] Yeah, I think this career report has really forced the country to hold the mirror up to itself. Not just the country, but the industry, right? You know, we see a nation grappling with what it means to return to balance after years of policy sugar highs and emotional roller coasters. The real estate industry is finally coming to odds with the really difficult hand that it's been dealt. You know, to anyone watching the market, yes, the election mattered.

[00:19:14] Third, policy promises could very well shape the path forward and may even pull back some buyers into it, you know, with a lot of these first-time homebuyer promises. But let's not pretend that the results alone will flip a switch, right? Ottawa can't legislate confidence back into the market overnight. And no housing platform, however ambitious, will fix affordability and inventory challenges in one stroke. And we're still really dealing with this trade war issue.

[00:19:39] So I'm curious, I think May, like, so we do have April, sorry, May stats, no, sorry, April stats from the Toronto Real Estate Board. And they're bad, like they're very, really bad. Very bad. I think the worst, like since a really long time. Isn't it maybe since like the 90s? Yeah, I think since the 90s. Holy man. But Toronto is not the country, right? Like that's kind of what we just went through. Yes. Yeah. And so there are all these hyper-local trends in markets.

[00:20:08] But, you know, the real decisions will still be made around kitchen tables or around, you know, investors having these decisions with calculators and models and context and a deep breath, right? We aren't, I don't think we're in a housing, you know, or I don't think we're in a market crisis, but we are at a crossroads in how Canadians choose to move next, especially investors. I think investors, like a lot of people are kind of looking, waiting to see when investors are going to reenter the market.

[00:20:34] And going back to the 90s thing that you just mentioned, there was this moment, like one of the reasons why a lot of baby boomers don't like real estate is because of what happened in the 90s and Gen Xers as well, right? And don't like, not just real estate, but don't like debt, right? They don't like holding those large mortgages or rolling those mortgages. But yeah, sorry, continue. No, I think that that's, like, I think we're going through that 90s moment right now in our market. So let's just kind of like riff on a little couple of things that you and I have been seeing across the country.

[00:21:03] GTA market, mostly a condo story, like condos pretty bad, but prices are down now in the GTA and like every asset or every product type. So like, you know, and that's like four to 7% down year over year. So the GTA is not having a good time, but Alberta seems to be, I don't know. What do you see in there? Man, Alberta, as I had kind of previously alluded to, is killing it by everything I can tell.

[00:21:32] Yeah, I mean, I can't speak for Calgary as much. I mean, Dan, you and I are pretty ingrained in both Calgary and Edmonton just through the amazing people we have in our communities. I know that Calgary is still hot. We're just out there in Edmonton. Yeah, and man, the guys in Edmonton, so shout out to JD, Glenn, and Cody, who are our new meetup hosts taking over Edmonton. These guys are doing some awesome stuff. We're going to be doing some different style events out there, like bus tours, tours of their investment properties and stuff.

[00:22:02] So we're mixing it up a little bit. And then shout out to Abby as well, one of our students in Realist, who is just an amazing young man. He's going to be covering the Calgary meetup until we bring on a couple new hosts, which we're kind of going through the, I don't want to call it the interview process because we're not corporate guys. Dan, that sounds pretty corporate, but I guess it's kind of that courting anyways. We're mutually courting one another. And listen, like Alberta.

[00:22:29] Yeah, I mean, if anybody wants to sponsor or partner in that meetup group, be happy to have it. Or any meetup group across the country. Remember, we've got 26 of these things. And going back to kind of what we were talking about earlier, Dan, the value from these meetups is so much more than just getting out and networking.

[00:22:47] For us and for anyone that decides to get a little more involved, this really is that unique perspective into a boots on the ground, active investor insight. Where, you know, you and I can sit here and look at charts and be like, okay, well, the GTA sucks. You know, we know the markets that we like. And, you know, Edmonton may as well be a foreign country to me because I don't know what the hell is going on there.

[00:23:12] But we've created an ecosystem, both in real life and online, where you can get involved and understand the intricacies and the nuances and the opportunities within those markets. So on that note, yeah, I mean, Edmonton, Calgary, both killing it. I'm really excited to get out to Halifax, Dan. We're flying out next week. So I think this. Yeah, the meetups will be the day that this episode drops. Yeah. So yeah, we're going to be there Tuesday, May 13th.

[00:23:42] Going to go hang out with Ryan, who's our meetup host out there. Ryan, Neil, I think Chandler are going to record a couple of podcasts, get a couple of tours of some of the properties and projects they got going on out there and hopefully eat some delicious seafood, man. That's kind of what I'm looking forward to as well. Yeah. You have been talking about that a lot. I think you like, that's just like, you're such a Tony Toronto. Like you just think, oh, it's like, I'm going out to the East coast. I'm just only going to eat seafood there. They do have great seafood.

[00:24:11] I'm a big scallops guy, actually. That's what I'm thinking. They call them scallops there though. Scallops. Okay. Start practicing now. Be sure to pronounce that correctly. Hopefully that's better than your French. Yeah. Nothing gets worse than that. Yeah. Some of the, it's the most fun thing ever being on these deal review calls.

[00:24:36] We've got people bringing like, hey, here's this, you know, like two bed, two bed, tiny two bedroom cottage that I'm looking at in some like little mountain town in the interior BC. And I'm like, this is like the dream. Yeah. Right. And we're underwriting these deals. And then it's like, here's a 40 unit, you know, apartment building that I'm, you know, building in, uh, in Alberta with a CMHC MLI select. So check it out. We have a one week free trial. It's only a hundred bucks a month for the group coaching, uh, one-on-one coaching sold out for at least another six months. Um, but join the community. We'd love to see you in there.

[00:25:05] Check out realist.ca and you can click to get a free trial. And now without further ado, the main stars of the show are meetup hosts. Okay. Welcome back to what is quickly becoming my favorite segment of the Canadian real estate investor podcast, where we get to go coast to coast and talk to a bunch of real estate experts around the country. I'm very excited for today's discussion because the market is incredibly temperamental right now.

[00:25:29] And, um, there's a lot of uncertainty that we need to kind of manage away, let's call it as professionals in our space. And so I want to know how your local markets are dealing with that. And I also obviously want to know who you are and where your meetup is and how your meetup went. But then I also want to understand, you know, what kind of seems to be, what are people saying on the ground? What, what's, you know, to list the sort of factors that I see in play right now. And if you listen to the podcast, I'm sure you're aware of these. And if you're just, you know, don't live under a rock, you're probably aware of them. Trade wars, obviously a big thing. Tariffs.

[00:25:56] And I think the Canadian elections, these are kind of the three big layers of uncertainty that we're dealing with right now. And I'm very curious to hear how they're impacting markets coast to coast. So we will start off with Ryan in Halifax. Let us know who you are. How was your meetup and what's going on there? You're muted. I'll jump to Brennan and Caro and I'll come back to you. Hey, everybody. Brennan and Caro here. We help people and businesses optimize their finances through our mortgage channel, as well as fractional CFO services. We had an amazing meetup in the Niagara region. We had about 20 people show up.

[00:26:26] A lot of, a lot more individuals than last time. Certainly, I think people looking to collaborate and learn more a little bit about how people are navigating this market. As Dan mentioned, lots of uncertainty. So a lot of people sitting on the sidelines, but they're getting cash ready to acquire. Because they're seeing it more so as an opportunity. Everybody knows that a lot of these things are sort of man-made as opposed to the COVID area where there's a lot more uncertainty from that. So I think over the next few months, a lot more people are expecting the dust to settle. Yeah.

[00:26:55] I think we also saw a great variety of folks out there. We saw a 16-year-old come out with her dad who wanted to get started in real estate investing. And we saw people that have been in the business for 20 years. So it was really cool. And what we're noticing as well is that the newbies, they're not really afraid of what's going on because maybe it's just like, you know, they don't know what to expect. And so they're just really excited about getting into their first property. But it is more of the people that have had experience with real estate investing that seem to be a little bit more hesitant to see what happens until after the election. Yeah.

[00:27:24] I think it's, you know, I guess people who don't necessarily have exposure to like they don't have equity that's getting impacted by all these things. It's easier to just kind of see it purely as an opportunity, right? Which is a good mentality. That's like kind of that beginner's mind. You'd hope that some investors see it in the same way, right? Good. That's awesome insight. Ryan, let's jump back to you and let me know how it went out in Halifax. Yeah, absolutely. Thanks, Dan. Ryan McNeil, president of Keystone, Mick. We're the hosts of the Halifax meetup out here. We were straight back to winter conditions yesterday with school closures in the whole nine yards.

[00:27:54] Unfortunately, that's what you get on the East Coast. We got terrible weather, but at least we got affordable housing. So luckily things cleared up a bit for us. We still had a solid turnout with about 20 attendees coming out. So a little bit light for us, but still solid. Honestly, market sentiment has been very resilient. The numbers still showing things are very strong in Nova Scotia. Prices up about 6-7% year to date. Listings up by about the same amount. Realtors I was speaking to in the room last night said anything that's sub 700K,

[00:28:24] which is slightly above the average price out here, is still moving very quickly. Multiple offers, even a little bit higher than that in the stronger neighborhoods. I'd say there's some concern from a tariff perspective around new home construction and prices continuing to increase there. And on the other side of the coin, I'd say multifamily is a different story out here. A lot of uncertainty from investors. Thousands of units coming to the market in the next couple of years.

[00:28:48] So some investors are actually cashing out as they're seeing vacancies increase and expecting continued declines in immigration. So overall, still super bullish on the Halifax market, especially with potential major increases in military spending, which will be very beneficial to our market out here. Thanks, Ryan. Also worth noting, Nick and I will actually be in Halifax. Looking forward to that. Looking forward to meeting you and meeting your community.

[00:29:13] So anybody who's listening from the Halifax market or I guess the East Coast, the whole East Coast, the whole Atlantic Canada, because I think you guys are all jet setters who sort of puddle jump back and forth between different East Coast cities. We'd love to see anybody who's out there to come hang out at the meetup. Next on the list, I have Jonathan. How did it go in Toronto? Hey, everyone. Jonathan. I work alongside Dan and Nick bringing all these meetups across the country. And we had a good meetup last night in Toronto. Actually, one of our smaller ones. We had about 20 people.

[00:29:39] But we've been on a bit of a tear over the last couple of months with we've been averaging about 60. So 20 was a little bit more of an intimate room. But we had a lot of high quality kind of conversations. In terms of a lot of the uncertainty, there's kind of two ways I guess we've seen a lot of stuff on the ground. A lot of people just come in with a lot of questions of how do we feel this is going to kind of impact the market? How is their financing going to look? How conservative should they be?

[00:30:04] But very similar to Brandon and Caro, like a lot of people looking to kind of get set up and looking at it as an opportunity. So while there's a lot of that uncertainty, we've noticed a lot of people just trying to kind of get their ducks in a row to see how they can kind of capitalize. So still nothing too optimistic. But people aren't quite scared off too much yet. Awesome. Yeah, interesting to hear. Next up, we got Zach. How's it going, Zach? How was your meetup? Tell us a little bit about it and then what your market seems to be saying about this uncertainty. Sure. Thanks, Dan.

[00:30:34] This is Zach Denny from Prince Edward Island. And I run our local meetup here. And as well, I'm a realtor with Royal LePage. Just like Ryan said, somehow on the east, we got hit with a bit of a little snowstorm in mid-April. So it was one of our smaller ones. But we had half a dozen or so people out. And one of our members led a discussion on estimating renos. So it was good with a small little crew of people.

[00:30:58] So in terms of the sentiment in our market, I think PEI especially a lot like Atlanta, Canada is kind of its own little bubble. And we don't seem to have the big dips up and down like the rest of Canada. So although there is a lot of tariff and election chatter, it doesn't actually seem to be impacting things on the island in my opinion. I know for me personally, like the past four months have been way busier than the whole year prior.

[00:31:25] From similar to what Ryan said too in Halifax, like less movement from the big stuff with investors. But anything under $500,000 has been super competitive, sometimes multiple offers and pretty close to asking price. Awesome. Very interesting. Nick, I guess you want to let me know. I know how Edmonton went because I was there with you. But if you can tell me how it was, I'd love to. I'm sure our audience would love to hear about it. Yeah. Well, I appreciate it. It's fun being on this side of the mic.

[00:31:51] Like, yeah, Dan, as you're well aware, you and I were in Edmonton for about 12 hours. I think it was about a 24-hour trip in general with travel time. And man, it was an awesome time. Great event. Great to spend a bit of time in that city where we toured some multifamily properties with some of our clients and looked at some great investment properties. The sentiment was just really high there. A really great mix of people, had some really young people, some university students come out and then had some legacy people,

[00:32:20] some older long-term investors with hundreds of doors, a bunch of professionals. And people are just getting all kinds of deals done out there. It was really awesome to see. I mean, I'm talking flips, BRRRRs, multifamily properties. Kind of nothing seemed to kind of shake what people were doing out there. The one thing I did here which was a little tougher was some financing is, you know, lenders are tightening up. You know, CMHC came up, but more traditional methods of financing also seemed to be a bit harder.

[00:32:48] That did not seem to stop anybody out there. Probably had about, I don't know, between 40 and 50 people. And we were there long past the 8 o'clock shutdown, which is always a good sign. So tons of fun. Great time. Great city. Great to see people out there killing it. And looking forward to going back to Alberta sooner than later. Yeah. Well, we will be out there actually for the stampede. We're going to be redoing the real estate rodeo. We have, yeah, Live Rent is going to be doing that. And if anybody else is interested in hopping in on the real estate rodeo,

[00:33:18] I would love to see out there as a sponsor and attendee or whatever. Cowboy cap required. Yeah. Nick, he cosplays as a cowboy whenever we go into Alberta. So let's go over to Jack and Alex. Jack, you want to start us off and then send it over to Alex? Yeah. Thanks again. Jack Ramsey with Remax Generation, a.k.a. Jack Attack, along with my good partner and friend, Alex Burns. We've got one of the top real estate teams here on Vancouver Island. Yeah.

[00:33:46] We had a great turnout yesterday. 24 people. Whether it was our advertising, our promoting, or the Tuesday tacos, I think it was a mixture of all. It was a great event. We kept things really positive. I mean, things here are very, very good in terms of real estate. Weather's great. Our clients are putting out offers and we just really didn't get into any negativity. But everything was upbeat talking about the booming areas here on the island. And that's how we talk to all our clients is the potential of what 5, 10 years down the road looks like.

[00:34:14] So we've got some communities just outside of Victoria that are just taking off. And I'll let Alex Burns talk a little bit about what else we discussed. But thanks again for having us and appreciate it, guys. Yeah. Awesome. Go ahead, Alex. So we're seeing, you know, certainly the local Victoria people getting a little bit more bang for their buck moving north. And one of the advantages is these communities are popping up on the island. There are a lot of new constructions. So, you know, a lot of people are looking to downsize into something a bit more efficient.

[00:34:43] But as far as investment properties, it's still pretty safe. We're not getting huge cash flow opportunities. But with market appreciation, it's a good investment for Vancouver Island. We've got lots of different industries that give us that push. Even if the market is a bit tight across the country, the economy is still pretty strong here. So, yeah, appreciate it. I've been with Remax for 20 years. And Jack and I are hustling and trying to find opportunities all the time for our clients. So if you have anybody looking, we'd be happy to help them. Awesome. Thanks, Alex.

[00:35:13] Let's hop over to Serge here in the Ottawa market. Thanks. Thanks, Daniel. So Serge Papineau here. I'm a realtor in Ottawa and host of the Ottawa meetup. So we had our own little snowstorm in Ottawa yesterday, but we still ended up with about 20 people. That showed up to the meetup. So pretty good turnout, really good conversations, mix of experience levels. And as is custom, our meetup went well past the 8 o'clock cutoff time as well. As far as the Ottawa market, things are definitely slower than usual in Ottawa.

[00:35:41] We hit nine-year lows for sales volume in March for both condos and Freehold properties. Condo market had been struggling for a little bit, but Freehold's been doing quite well. So not totally surprising to see. The biggest issue, biggest amount of, I guess, the biggest cause of uncertainty in Ottawa is really the federal election. Federal government's our main employer here. And there's a sense that if the Conservatives get in, they'll probably cut a lot of those jobs.

[00:36:07] So I think it's putting a lot of people in sort of wait and see mode as far as making moves. And so, yeah, it's kind of a slower market right now. Our spring market hasn't really started yet. Yeah, I think that seems to be one of the themes is like we might just see a bit of a delayed spring market. You know, it seems like maybe not going to be disappeared, but I think a lot of people at least are waiting for the election to see not just, you know, like the trade war thing is, you know, totally outside of our country. And so it's not really within the scope of even the control of our democracy. Right.

[00:36:36] But it's who who's going to be dealing with that. I think it would maybe indicate who we end up or sorry, how we end up like how, you know, thinking the market's going to be for the next couple of years. I'm going to jump over to Jessica in Vancouver. How did it go yesterday? Hey, Dan. So this is Jessica here, mortgage broker with ClearTrust Signature Mortgages, and I run the Vancouver meetup with James. Yesterday night was definitely one of our slower nights. I think we had about 15 people show up.

[00:37:04] We are looking to basically move the meetup back into Olympic Village area just because I think we typically have better turnout over there. In terms of conversation last night, I think it was a little bit of everything we're starting to hear, at least on my end. Like I heard a couple of people ask about private lending just because I think tighter lending guidelines. So people are exploring alternative options. And then an investor, a couple of investors came in and they came just to see what this market sentiment is.

[00:37:32] And they're a little bit just nothing happening to their condo units right now, but they're more curious and worried about what the market for rents will be in the next couple of months. In terms of sentiments, to be honest, it hasn't really slowed down over here from what we've seen. Buyers are still buying. It's just a longer process. Offers are, you know, people are putting in offers, but sellers are just not accepting perhaps the first offer and waiting a little bit. And buyers are also not willing to increase.

[00:38:01] So we're seeing a lot of buyers basically resubmit their original offers and sellers having to come down a little bit. But market hasn't slowed down. I think things are just taking a little bit longer than usual. Yeah, it makes sense. I mean, there's a lot more factors to consider for all parties, the banks, the buyers, sellers, etc. And so it would make sense that people are a little bit more slower to transact. Let's jump over to Tiri here in Montreal. How did it go? And what's the sentiment there? Hi, Daniel. Thank you. For having us. So my name is Tiri.

[00:38:30] I'm with Plex Doctor. We're a property management company out here in Montreal, the area of Montreal. And I'm co-hosting with LJ Aguina from LJ Realties. Yesterday, we had the snowstorm. We had the app games. So we were a little bit smaller than usual. For the people that show up at the meetup, we talked about a little bit transitioning from maybe more single family or condos to multifamily. That was mostly the talk we had. A lot of people, great quality interaction between them.

[00:39:00] The Montreal market right now, the sentiment we have, it's still going strong. Sales are up. Prices up. Time on the market is low. So people that were waiting on the sidelines start to activate a lot here. So I will say it's pretty active and people are still buying. Awesome. And then this is really interesting. I actually thought it was going to be more of a pause button for everybody. But it seems like it's sort of just steadfast and like, yeah, we don't care. Like, you know, we're just going to keep moving. Still got to do this. It all kind of exists outside of our industry.

[00:39:29] So we'll finish it off last but not least here with Mike in Vaughn. Who are you? How did the meetup go? And what seems to be the sentiment around economic uncertainty right now? Yeah, Mike Kardashian, Remax Premier and Wolf Den Inc. We had a decent meetup yesterday. I was pretty fired up. We're talking a lot about commercial real estate. And I love talking about that sort of thing. So I was really nice. A little bit more, I would say, enthusiasm coming from the commercial space again, which

[00:39:57] is really nice to see, not just in the multiplexing space, but also in like larger building type stuff. We're talking about some plots out in Collingwood, but some infill stuff in Toronto. So that was pretty interesting. As far as more general market sentiments, the stats aren't great. But I mean, like just last week, I picked up a handful of listings myself. So I think the sellers are probably starting to come back. I don't know if that's more so because they kind of are not as worried about the uncertainty

[00:40:24] anymore, as most people here have mentioned, or if that's just a sign of the delayed spring market. I think more generally speaking, general sentiment is, yeah, more or less holding steady. But I would almost want to push it towards the side of saying, you know, people are becoming a little bit more enthusiastic about it. There are still a lot of showings on not just my personal listings, but even from people in my office. So I think that, yeah, although people aren't, you know, super gung ho to go in and start

[00:40:52] bidding up and, you know, putting in high offers and things like that. I think that we're probably going to start pulling out of it pretty soon here. That's my personal thought. I mean, based on what everyone else has said as well, I think everyone at these meetups is kind of thinking the same thing, you know, buy when it's a little bit troublesome and enjoy the benefits later on. And I think that's really starting to show not just at the meetups, but also just more generally in the market sentiment. Yeah. I mean, I think that it, you know, when I look at the data at a national level and we'll

[00:41:20] present that data at the beginning of this episode, typically, I mean, sales are definitely down, right? But so it wouldn't surprise me that like the people who remain in the market are definitely more optimistic. They're the ones that are out there looking for a deal. They're trying to kind of buy the dip. They're trying to catch the falling knife, you might say, or whatever it is. So that optimism actually, that would make sense. But I think like the people who maybe are less optimistic just aren't in the market, which I think is what we're seeing in the numbers where, you know, sales are definitely lower than they were this time last year in most cities across Canada and at a national level.

[00:41:50] I think that that'll probably pick up like the uncertainty, you know, if it gets bad, in a worst case scenario, it'll materialize in decreased rates, which will make housing more affordable and more people will start piling into the market, especially if that kind of coincides with the uncertainty also going away, you know, God willing, because it's definitely a mess out there right now. So I'll leave it there. Thank you all very much. And we'll see you next month. And just a reminder, next month, we're in Halifax.

[00:42:17] The content of this podcast is for educational and informational purposes only. It is not intended as financial, legal or investment advice. Always consult a qualified professional for advice tailored to your unique circumstances. The views expressed are those of the hosts and guests and do not necessarily reflect the opinions of affiliated organizations. Daniel Foch is a real estate broker licensed with Valerie Real Estate Inc. Website is Valerie.ca, V-A-L-E-R-Y.ca.

[00:42:44] And a member of the Canadian Real Estate Association, the Ontario Real Estate Association, and the Toronto Real Estate Board. Nick Hill is a mortgage agent and partner at OWL. Mortgage license number 10317. Agent license M21004037. Agent license M210037.