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Agents complain of closed process to open MLS

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Some real estate agents are unhappy with being kept in the dark on the decision to open the MLS:

The vast majority of the country’s 100,000 real estate agents won’t see the details of the plan until after it has been voted on by top representatives of the country’s 101 real estate boards next Sunday – though details were leaked to The Globe and Mail last week by industry insiders.

The decision to keep the contents under wraps until their elected representatives approve of the deal is being explained as a legal decision, but rank-and-file real estate agents across the country are frustrated they are being cut out of the process.

“CREA is really trying to keep the details away from the great unwashed because they don’t know how we’d react if we saw them,” said Brian Martindale, a Century 21 agent in Peterborough, Ont. “The last thing they want is for us to be upset and making noise while they try and settle.”

Read the full article in The Globe and Mail.

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jesse

@patriotz: The released statement states:

With housing activity declining markedly as anticipated and household debt considerations becoming more important, the Bank expects household expenditures to decelerate to a pace closer to the rate of income growth over the projection horizon. Overall, the composition of demand in Canada is expected to shift away from government and household expenditures towards business investment and net exports.

After re-reading this again, I think it's hard to read into what "household debt considerations" means. Monetary policies are accommodative so the BoC may simply be "banking" on the market running out of fools.

I wouldn't be surprised if the government gives more incentives to businesses over the next while, such as increasing depreciation allowances or some other similar business-focused policy.

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patriotz

@jesse:

Good question. It's clear that Carney has told Flaherty that Canada is headed for a US-style housing bust if many more people buy at current prices. And we may get one anyway.

It's up to Flaherty and Harper to decide if they want to keep pouring gasoline on the fire or start putting it out. Carney has made it clear that he cannot raise interest rates without damaging the broader economy.

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jesse

@patriotz: Do you think they meant there will be further policy changes at CMHC or just the natural weight of the current market.

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patriotz

@Anonymous:

Translation: The housing bubble is doomed even if the government doesn't tighten up on mortgage guarantees. That's as clear a message as you're ever going to get from the BoC.

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No_Basement_Suites

Slightly off topic but…

Can any of you out there recommend any good aprtment hunting sites for the lower mainland besides cragslist? Have any of you used any of the professional services that help you find an apartment or have you used any of the professional management companies. The kid running around upstairs is driving me crazy!

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Anonymous

@Londonernow:

The bank said with household debt so high, it expects Canadians will spend less on consumer goods and on homes, meaning the housing market is in for a protracted cooling-off period.

http://ca.news.finance.yahoo.com/s/19102010/2/biz…

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Londonernow

Surprise, surprise,the BOC didn't raise rates. If the Canadian economy is humming along nicely why is the BOC rate at 1% – the same rate as Europe where countries are essentially bankrupt!

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patriotz

@Anonymous:

Doesn’t matter if rent is controlled

Rents aren't controlled. A landlord can ask for any rent they want from a new tenant. And the evidence is that the controls for sitting tenants are moot, since most increases are under the limit.

Even if the controls for sitting tenants weren't moot, it really wouldn't matter, since rental properties turn over every couple years on average.

The only province with real rent controls is Quebec.

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Dan in Calgary

, Read my comment in context of your #59, not in context of anything you wrote later. I'm sorry you can't see that your thinking is fuzzy. Maybe you just have a natural gift for making things complicated.

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Anonymous

@realpaul

And of course the crea economist says the rent/buy ratio is meaningless

People seems to have lost all idea that the value of a home is the present value of all future rents

Doesn't matter if rent is controlled, if that's the cash u get each month, that's what the income is, doesn't matter if it's the result of controls etc. In fact, the limitation on income growth is a reason for the value of the home to be limited.

as Todd bertuzzi said, it is what it is…

Idiots…soon we will hear quotes from the RE industry that paying more in expenses each month is a good thing…negative equity is a good thing…

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realpaul

An average crack shack in Vancouver selling for one million dollars can rent out at about $1500 p/m…This works out to 666.666 x's rent…..is the universe trying to tell us something?

The buy rent ratio published by Desjardins Securities also foretells disaster of biblical proportions.

http://www.theglobeandmail.com/report-on-business…

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jesse

@Dan in Calgary: If you have a way of determining accepted from the data we have I'd like to hear it. What's important is mom and yoy with a consistent data set. Who cares if an accepted offer in September completes in October as long as it doesn't change over time.

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Dan in Calgary

@MakeSense,

Notwithstanding you got voted down, I think there is merit in what you say.

,

Your thinking is a bit fuzzy, imho. I think the issue is when a property was sold, not when it was recorded.

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jesse

@Anonymous: "But presumably subjects can be removed on a weekend, but the sale won’t be registered until the Monday?" We're measuring total sales in a month. This is because we are comparing month-over-month and same-month sales from past years. As long as the data are captured with the same method it doesn't matter as long as the measures are consistent. It's a 2-mode periodic sample function and it all works out in the end in terms of total sales. It's not like were doing Fourier analysis or anything, just simple linear projections in which jitter should have close to no effect. Remember we're measuring completed sales which will have a distributed delay from accepted date, depending upon subjects, so offers accepted on a weekend get smoothed out. If you go through the data, notice how there are no sales surges… Read more »

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VHB

@Anonymous: Are the sales and listings numbers triple on Mondays what they are on other days of the week? No. I think 'working days' is the right concept to go with, myself.

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NO - LYMPICS

How about a new parameter

RASTTBS Realtor's asses stuck to their boileroom seats

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Anonymous

@jesse:

"Sales are registered only on working days. "

But presumably subjects can be removed on a weekend, but the sale won't be registered until the Monday?

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Anonymous

So suddenly a high sell/list isn't relevant? I bet if it's 20% tomorrow then it'll suddenly become relevant again. A bit like how inventory was important until it dropped, and suddenly MOI was the next big thing. Now it's price reductions. By December it'll be something else – my guess is Days On Market.

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Edward

Still lots of sales. Just goes to show that interest rates (currently the lowest ever from our nervous banks) will keep the lemmings buying for a while yet. Poor bastards.

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jesse

@MakeSense: Your moniker is ironic. Sales are registered only on working days. No soup for you.

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MakeSense

I think the way to use "business days" to estimate total sales in a month is not accurate. Since there are more deals done during the weekend or holiday (although deals are reported to mls.ca during the weekdays) than a business day.

So I decided to populate a new number based on the number of day elapsed (not the number of business days elapsed)

October Projections for month totals

Days elapsed so far 18

Average daily sales: 73.8

Estimated monthly sales: 73.8 X 31 = 2286

Average daily Listings: 130

Estimated monthly Listings:130 X 31 = 4031

Estimated Sales/Listing Ratio: 56%

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sluggo

Who cares about sell/list when we get 160 price reductions in a day.

That is AWESOME!!!!!

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VHB

@Anonymous: Sell-list is indeed high–but that's like winning gold in the special olympics. Sales are still on pace for 2nd slowest in 10 years.

Seems like someday soon we'll have 25 sales and 24 listings and someone will get all excited about the 'boom'.

There is no boom right now. There is no crash. There is pause and see you in '11.

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VHB

October Projections for month totals

Days elapsed so far 11

Days remaining 9

Average Sales this month 114

Average Listings this month 201

Projected sell/list 56.7%

SALES

Projected month end total 2282 +/- 141

95% Conf Interval lower bound 2141

95% Conf Interval upper bound 2423

NEW LISTINGS

Projected month end total 4027 +/- 221

95% Conf Interval lower bound 3806

95% Conf Interval upper bound 4248

MONTHS OF INVENTORY

Inventory as of September 30th 15401

MoI at this sales pace 6.75

Note: This is a simple linear projection of month end totals.

This provides the answer to the question

"What will month end totals be, if things continue

on the same pace we've seen so far this month?"

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real_professional

ha ha – Olympics…what? … you know that thing that happened, back then.

From that Province story

"It’s expected that about $11 million of the $20-million shortfall will be covered by a residential tax increase of about two per cent."

– Taxes won't increase they said? Tis even better to rent in Vancouver! Tis

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