Fort McMurray sales in 2014 shows how badly declining oil prices has affected the areas real estate condition. According to Calgary Herald, sales dropped by 43.5 percent from 2014 as the average sales value plunged down to 6.2 percent. Last year was considered the biggest decline in the area.
One of the very few exception was real estate market in Lethbridge that has seen an increase of 4.5 percent year-over-year. Medicine Hat spearheaded in terms of price gain with an increase in average sales price of four percent. However, MLS sales in Alberta were down by 21.3 percent province wide in 2015. Only 56,477 units have been sold with an average sale price of $393,138 that is down by 1.9 percent.
According to Calgary Herald, the MLS sales for 10 Alberta markets surveyed and the percentage of change from 2014 to 2015
- Fort McMurray, 974 (down by 43.5 per cent)
- Lloydminster, 615 ( down by 34.6 per cent)
- South Central Alberta, 383 (down by 30.0 per cent)
- Grande Prairie , 2,394 (down 28.8 per cent)
- Calgary, 23,994 (down 28.6 per cent)
- Alberta West, 1,105 (down 26.0 per cent)
- Central Alberta, 4,439 (down 19.2 per cent)
- Medicine Hat, 1,360 (down 16.0 per cent)
- Edmonton, 18,670 (down 9.1 per cent)
- Lethbridge, 2,543 (up 4.5 per cent)
Don Campbell, senior analyst with the Real Estate Investment Network said, "Conversely, due to the less diverse economies of the smaller centers in the province, we always witness dramatic swings of the market pendulums as layoffs and economic stagnation hit these smaller cities much more quickly and with much more fervor."
On the other hand he has pointed Lethbridge's resilience saying that it is an example of why an economy should be diverse, emphasizing that it may be behind while the rest of the markets are seeing boom but it is the lease affected when something inevitable, such as declining oil prices, happens.
