The November edition of CMHC's "Housing Now" report for Victoria is now available.

Highlights include (the usual):
- robust construction activity.
- low unemployment.
- a slowing in new home starts.

CMHC's construction volume graph changed this month. Last month, construction volume was displayed as a total for Greater Victoria. This month, it's a bar graph for the different regions (figure 1). Perhaps the change is due to the fact that the old graph was downright scary, as under construction numbers are at record highs, and continue increasing.

If Victoria's construction volume dropped from today's number of 3296 units under construction, to historical norms, around 1000 units under construction, I wonder what the city's unemployment level would be. What if construction dropped to 1990's levels?

This week Trivia Night will be on Wednesday night at the special time of 8:30 PM, due to the Celtics playoff game being on tonight. The crowd will just be too big and the game won't end before 11 PM, so the change was in order.

And this week's Special Category will be, in honor of Victoria Day, "Canadian Trivia." (Victoria Day was this past Monday, for those of you who weren't busy celebrating.) It will be seven questions about our neighbors to the north, with a special bonus points question to conclude the category. We will also have the usual four categories. So get your thinking touques on! (That was a McKenzie Brothers reference.)

The Sneak Peek question for tomorrow night is:

What ancient written language did the Rosetta Stone help decipher?

Hope to see many of you for Trivia Night on Wednesday!

We live in some crazy times, and they keep getting crazier.

Oil hit $135 a barrel this week, and will go higher. Goldman Sachs is thinking $200 / barrel within 2 years.

Another Canadian bank, RBC, is proclaiming that the Canadian housing boom is over. We all know Alberta's market is slumping and Canada's is slowing dramatically. There are 17286 properties for sale in Greater Vancouver. There is an 11.2 month supply of homes in the US.

Victoria, of course, is no different. Sales have slowed. Inventory doesn't stop rising. Right now, we are at 4522 properties for sale in Greater Victoria.

Three posts in three days.......It's a blogging frenzy!!!

This latest Commonwealth Bank campaign got me thinking.....how far off the mark are these guys and what really is a relevant insight for a banking customer?

And do you have to employ an american ad agency and feature the bloke who directed Transformers to bring that insight to life?

Maybe the client got sucked into the typical ad agency hype about how an ad has to be funny for it to be effective. I've had this shoved in my face so many times without any insight back to how the target is likely to respond to it in the context of what the brand is trying to say.

So here's the thing. 20 years ago the State Bank of Victoria created an amazing campaign that worked it's way into the vernacular with four words - "It's your money Ralph".

Two actors on a couch, with a newspaper prop, well directed and well written.

It's not funny. It's just true. And it struck a major chord.

Guess which bank owns the State Bank of Victoria now?

Colleen Gleason
334 pages
On my Bookshelves

This is my second title for the 2nds Challenge hosted by Thoughts of Joy

Statistics Canada has released the New Housing Price Index for July.

Once again, Victoria is showing some of the slowest month over month and year over year new house price gains. For the period of July 2006 to July 2007, Victoria had a 1.1% change in the new house price index. Tops was Saskatoon at 51.4%.

"For Canada, the pace of growth in new housing prices slowed for the 11th consecutive month in July. It went from 7.8% in June to 7.7% in July.

Saskatoon set a record high year-over-year increase for the fifth consecutive month. Prices in Winnipeg were 15.7% higher than in July 2006 in the wake of land shortages and development costs. New housing prices in Edmonton continued to increase at a fast pace with a year-over-year increase of 38.4%, due to hikes in land values from developers."

Go figure.

I'm glad to see that this blog keeps going even when I'm absent - just like an energizer bunny!

FYI, we haven't bought, we haven't even been to a mortgage broker. In fact, I think we have decided to stay put for the time being. We'll make it work where we are!

It does appear that the market may have turned over the past 1-2 months. Listings are rocketing upwards, sales "appear" to be really low and slow. Realtors are saying that the market has "stabilized", some are even recommending to not rush into anything. People are talking about the slowing of the market, and friends are advising friends to be careful when looking at purchasing. These are all people that I think were very positive on the market 6 months ago.

The Victoria Real Estate Board has released their sales numbers for February. Discussion has started in the comments of the previous post. Please feel free to continue commenting on this post.

In comparison to February 2007, sales are down, prices are up, and listings are up. In comparison to January 2008, sales are up, prices are down, listings are up. The last time that Greater Victoria has seen two consecutive months of single family home price decreases was between June and August 2006. SFH average price has decreased 6% since it's peak in December 2007.

Average condo price has pretty much been horizontal since November 2006.

Average townhome price is off big-time from it's peak in November 2007.

I'd love to provide some graphs, but unfortunately, about 2 weeks ago I had a horrendous case of spyware on my computer and was forced to format my hard drive. I haven't located my copy of Excel as of yet. Once I do, the graphs will be back!

The number of listings on MLS.ca is down this Saturday in comparison to last Saturday. There are 22 fewer SFH, 11 fewer townhomes, and 17 fewer condos.

First of all, what a great couple of football games yesterday! Being from the prairies, I couldn't be happier! Winnipeg vs. Regina in the Grey Cup! Perhaps the CFL's greatest rivalry. Sunday's game should be a real barn-burner!

Back to real estate, following are graphs of sales numbers and median selling prices for Victoria, Saanich, Oak Bay, Esquimalt, and Langford. A picture is worth a thousand words, so that's all from me.

Victoria

For clarity -- and because not everyone could get to one of the meetings last night in NY or LA -- here's a handy little FAQ for some of the questions we're hearing.

What's the 48 hour vote for again?

It's a vote on whether or not to lift the strike (which in the Constitution is called "the restraining order".) If the vote passes, writers can go back to work.

It's not a vote on the contract,

This past Wednesday, I entered a contest over at the great web site Surviving Grady, as Red and Denton asked fans to write in with "the one person you'd love to spend a day with at Fenway Park." It could be anyone, living or dead, and you had to explain why. The winner gets the new 6-DVD set, "The Essential Games of Fenway Park."

The site got hundreds of entries, and the boys had a tough time narrowing it down to five. So, they expanded it to ten, and this morning, they announced on their site the finalists.

And my entry is one of the ten finalists.

I'm really blown away that it was chosen. If you go over to Surviving Grady, you can read it. It's not hard to figure out which is mine, but if you go to the fifth of the ten, "Dear Friend," that's mine.

MLS listings were up and down this week. There are 43 more condo listings today than there were last Saturday. I believe this is largely due to the release of units at the new Radius development. Kudos to them for listing on MLS. This will increase the month end inventory numbers, and thus give a truer picture of the number of homes that are for sale, unlike those condo developments that have hundreds of units for sale, but their inventory numbers are not taken into account by the VREB because they are not listed on MLS. Shame on them.

Title: Once and Always
Author: Judith McNaught
ISBN: 0671737627
Publisher: Pocket Books/1987
Pages: 375

CMHC has released their "Housing Now" report for April for Greater Victoria.

There are currently 4618 active property listings, approximately 550 more than 1 month ago.

I've seen Colleen Gleason's Gardella Vampire Chronicles raved about by all my blogger buddies. I've even been to Colleen's blog but until now I haven't read any of the series. Why? I have no idea. The Rest Falls Away has been on my TBR list for a long time. I just never got to it until now.

Victoria Gardella has just come out in society. Her mother's eager to find her a suitable husband. However, not only is Victoria hunting for a husband but for vampires as well. The Gardella Legacy has been passed to her. It is her destiny to keep the world safe from vampires. At her side in the fight is her reluctant partner Max Pesaro, her aunt Eustacia and her maid Verbena.

A new year has begun. For some, this means overcoming a hangover, others, time to reflect, speculate, or make goals for the next 366 days. I'm not a believer in resolutions. However, it is nice to start a new year in order to make statements like "I haven't had a smoke this year" or "The Canucks haven't lost this year". Those statements often don't last very long.

What will 2008 bring? I'm pretty excited - I think it will be a very interesting year. I feel that there is much at the tipping point. Governments, economies, real estate, beer prices. Regarding RE, I'd be along the lines of HHV's predictions. Victoria has peaked, but without the help of a major external influence, will not crash this year.

Inventory is continuing to rise, however, not at the pace that it was in March. According to this realtor's website, there are currently 4070 active listings in Greater Victoria. This is around 200 more than at the end of March. In comparison, the month of March saw an increase of around 350 listings on their website.

Today, there are 137 more SFH listings on MLS than on the 29th of March. The greatest increase in listings has been for SFH priced higher than $700k. There have been comments on the incredible number of listings with asking prices higher than $1 million. Today, there are 248 of such listings. Crazy!

There are 20 more townhomes listed today than there were on March 29. The number of condos listed is basically unchanged.

I'm sorry to interrupt the ongoing commentary. I just wanted to point out that CMHC has released their 4th quarter housing market outlook for Victoria. You can read it here.

Highlights according to CMHC are:
- Victoria's housing industry robust, growth spurred by strong economy.
- Resale market sales to edge down, prices to rise slowly.
- New homebuilding will level off in 2008.
- New home prices to rise.
- Rental vacancies will remain low.

I think I've heard that all before.

The Victoria Real Estate Board has posted March's sales numbers. Commentary on the numbers started in the last post. Please do continue. It looks to me like this year is going to the bears.

Following are SFH, condo, and townhome graphs for Greater Victoria. More are to follow in the coming days.

An on ice incident in the ECHL earlier this month, has a Victoria Salmon Kings player waiting to see if he'll be facing assault charges.
On March 1st, Robin Gomez who has since been suspended from the Salmon Kings line up, was involved in an altercation with the Las Vegas Wranglers Chris Ferraro.

Emotions are flying fast and furious around this issue: do we hold a ratification vote before we lift the strike? Or do we go back to work as quickly as Monday, and hold the vote afterwards?

To get our position up here as quickly and accurately as possible, we decided to do separate grafs signed by each of us, and combine them into one post.

We're all coming at this from different perspectives

From tonight's captains' bulletin:

To cast your ballot in person: Vote at the Writers Guild Theater, 135 S. Doheny Drive 90211. Tuesday, February 12, 2008 from 2:00 pm - 6:00 pm.

If members can't cast a ballot in person: Proxy ballots are available. To vote by proxy, download this form and fax to 323-421-9177. Proxies must be faxed in by Tuesday February 12, by 2 pm, or dropped off at the WGAW

I have to admit, I find this funny. Topps is putting out a special card this year of Your 2007 World Series Champion Boston Red Sox, and in the middle of it there is a superimposed picture of Rudy Giuliani, that "pseudo-Sox fan" joining in the middle of the celebration after the win in Colorado.

You may remember that Giuliani really pandered to voters in New Hampshire last October when he said he was pulling for the Red Sox in the World Series because he was "an American League fan." He came off as the worst type of politician, who'll say anything just to get your vote.

Wonder how he feels now that he's been shown in the middle of that pile of Red Sox players? He's got plenty of time to consider it these days, as he won't be welcoming the Sox, or any other team to the White House, as he won't be moving to 1600 Pennsylvania Avenue any time soon.

Voting on whether or not to lift the restraining order (legal jargon for calling off the strike) will take place in person at two meetings, one in NYC and one in LA.

If you cannot attend the meetings, you may vote by proxy. Today, there has been some confusion on what "voting by proxy" means. Faxing in a proxy vote form is NOT the same as voting. You are designating a fellow WGA member to vote

Everyone here at The Sports Flow is encouraging you to get out and vote at your states primary or caucus today. Exercise your right to vote, there is nothing more fundamental than our very own right to vote. This year, your vote matters more than ever. More and more people are turning out to vote, people want change. Our country is pretty divided right now, so your vote does indeed matter more than ever this year.

Just a couple of graphs showing townhome sales numbers and median sales prices over the previous years.