Indications Ottawa's housing market could start rebounding but supply at 20-year low

There are signs Ottawa's housing market is beginning to rebound, but supply is not meeting demand with the number of new listings at a 20-year-low.

Jason Anbara has been trying to buy a new house for more than a year. However, financing and prices were still too high.

"Rates are at 7 per cent. With the stress test you have to qualify at 9 per cent," Anbara says. "So your budget went from, let's say a million dollars down to $800,000. So it's been tough."

He says now that interest rates are holding steady, he’s more optimistic.

"That’s going to give us more affordability to put a better offer in to get the property that we’re looking for."

Statistics released by the Canadian Real Estate Association show average sale prices in Ottawa have dropped 15 per cent year-over-year, from roughly $760,000 in March 2022 to $640,000 in March 2023.

But it’s not clear if prices have hit a low yet. 

"Prices seem to have stopped falling all over the place," says Shaun Cathcart, CREA Senior Economist. "I expect that it's going to heat up further. Whether that's on the sales side if we get a lot of listings out there, which we don’t have right now. Or whether it's on the price side again, if we don't get a lot of listings, and all those buyers still come off the sidelines at the same time."

Real estate agent with Coldwell Banker First Ottawa, Nick Kyte, has had a busy two weeks. He says buyers are anxious to bid again.

"Next two and a half months are the busy time," Kyte says. "Right now, we're sitting at 3.1 months inventory for residential and 2.8 for condominium. That means, in layman's terms, that if no new homes came to market, it would take that long to sell the current inventory, which is not much."

As for Anbara, he’s hoping the time is right to buy with rates in some cases coming down.

"As low as 4.29 per cent on a five year fix," says Anbara. "Which is a lot better than what it was a few months ago."