Drumheller's housing crunch comes in three areas: a lack of affordable family homes,
a lack of starter homes, and a lack of retirement homes.
Local realtors have had a busy year, with home sales in the Drumheller area for 2014 ahead of home sales for the same period last year. Numbers from the Realtors Association of South Central Alberta show the 2013 annual sales for the area were reached this year in October.
For the Town of Drumheller, September’s urban sales were 14, which brought the year-to-date total up to 98 houses, with an average price of $245,471. This brought an increase of 3.1% over this time last year.
Rural Drumheller saw 2 September sales, bringing the year’s total to that point to 24 sales, with an average price of $172,658.
“I think what’s happened is we had a couple of slower years before this,” said Realtor Don Rosgen, “and I think it’s simply pent up demand. This year we’ve had more listings and more sales, I don’t think it’s because we’ve had much new industry come into Drumheller, it’s just typical ebb and flow of the market.”
Rosgen said pent up demand occurs over a couple of years where the real estate isn’t moving naturally, such as when people are downsizing or looking to buy a family home. He said one of the reasons for the slower times could be attributed to potential homeowners watching the market and waiting for a better time to buy.
“I get a lot of people looking to downsize, they have large family homes,” said local Realtor Stacey Gallagher.
“So they want the same as what they have, but less stairs, maybe a little bit less square footage. And to maybe take some equity out of their house.”
Gallagher said this is difficult because there isn’t a lot of retirement homes on the market. Both realtors say the area has a shortage of affordable family homes. In Drumheller, an affordable home would seem to be in the $200,000 to under $250,000 price range, three-bedroom bungalow with a garage.
After a steady fall, the local real estate market is now heading into its typical slower-paced sales period.
“Often times, people will take their houses off the market come winter, because they don’t want to move, or Christmas is coming. Or they don’t want them vacant for the winter, so they’ll rent them out,” said Gallagher.
Sales will start picking up again in the spring, and when they do, local realtors are positive for the coming year.
“I thinks it’s going to be steady,“ said Rosgen of 2015. “We’ve been very busy here, and it’s just been a great year for us, it’s been really busy into the fall now. We expect it to slow down of course, seasonally over Christmas. I don’t know why it wouldn’t be as good next year.”
