© Can Stock Photo / Feverpitched© Can Stock Photo / Feverpitched
Sarnia

Local real estate market holds steady amid economic uncertainty

The president of the Sarnia-Lambton Association of Realtors is reporting another "steady" month of local real estate sales.

Jeremy Guerette said 179 homes sold in May, bringing the dollar volume for the month up to $97.3 million.

"Both sales activity and dollar volume were up from April," Guerette said. "New listings were also up just slightly and active listings were also up just slightly. So, there's still lots of product to choose from, but things are moving."

There were 615 active listings last month, 342 of which were new.

The BOC held its key overnight rate at 2.75 per cent on June 4, and will make its next rate announcement on July 30.

Guerette thinks interest rates will be maintained for a while.

"The interest rates held steady again and it feels like maybe that's going to be the trend for a little bit. Unless tariffs causing inflation changes, I think the Bank of Canada (BOC) is going to be pretty cautious," he said.

Unlike recent years, Guerette said there isn't the same kind of rush to buy a home.

"Definitely people [are] thinking about it, not just moving for the sake of moving. Which I think is a good thing. There's a lot of product to choose from for buyers and at the current rates and prices, things are reasonably affordable," he said.

The median sales price was $505,000 in May and listings spent about 25 days on the market.

"I think the 25 days on market is pretty healthy," Guerette said. "I think that's a reasonable amount of time for a house on average to be up for sale."

Guerette said if interest rates go down, house prices may go up again, which he doesn't think would be the best thing for the market right now.

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