UPDATE: 11:15 a.m.

After crashing this morning, the Y Dream Home website is back up and running.

Ticket sales for the home lottery opened at 9 a.m., and users reported the site crashing within minutes.

Y Dream Home spokesperson Bryce Herman says organizers knew there would be a big rush off the start, but he says technicians have got the site stable. He says a backlog of thousands of transactions is now starting to be cleared.

“I guess a good problem to have in some ways. But the site really just got overwhelmed. Within the few short minutes of opening, there were almost $100,000 dollars in transactions that were processed. And it literally just brought the site to its knees,” he says.

“I think the biggest thing is that I just want to thank the community for the unbelievable support of the Y Dream Home lottery. And all I can say is, be patient, we’re on it. And thank you for your patience.”

All proceeds from the dream home lottery go to the Kamloops Y.

This year’s dream home is a single-family home in Westsyde, at #105 – 2575 Elston Drive, valued at $719,100.

Herman has said there are 18,000 tickets available for this year’s draw, which will take place in July. Last year, the lottery tickets sold out in 12 days for a home in Orchard’s Walk in Valleyview.