Real Estate activity in the Kamloops district was up slightly in March when compared to the same month last year. with 220 sales compared to 217 in 2019.

President of the Kamloops and District Real Estate Association Wendy Runge says looking at the housing stats for last month, it doesn’t really accurately describe what is going on currently.

“Real estate is a little bit delayed. We have transactions that are happening. By the time they are posted in our numbers, they’re about two, sometimes three weeks lagging behind. So if you just look at the numbers alone, the numbers look good. And we had a strong start to March which was really encouraging.”

Runge says activity was up and listings were up and then the reality of COVID-19 hit, and going forward we will starts to see those stats start to reflect what is happening.

“This is normal. There is a bit of a lag time from the time we write a transaction until the time they’re actually posted. So, that’s why these numbers look the way they do. And we had a strong start in March so we looked like we were heading into a really good spring market.”

Home prices were fairly stable in March with the Kamloops median price staying right around $500,000 and an average price of $428,321.  The average single family home price was also fairly flat year-over-year at $494,990 compared to $488,777, for a small gain of 1.2 per cent.

Runge says it is now starting to do business in a different way and is encouraging members to really follow safety protocols.

“There’s things like virtual tours. A lot of homes are now offering a virtual tour. We are seeing a lot of virtual meetings with out clients and even think outside the box. How can we do businesses, but differently in a safe way that protects the public.”

She encourages people who feel they need to do buy or sell during this time to call a licensed real estate professional and they can walk you through some of the protocols that they have in place.