Storm, Election, Interest Rates - Hamre Real Estate Team RE/MAX Affiliates Ottawa

Is there a band-aid solution? 

Ottawa just went through a three-day slowdown, that's not normal. 

My name is Greg Hamre from RE/MAX Affiliates in Ottawa and the Hamre Real Estate Team.

We've just seen a slow-down in 10 days at the beginning of June. 

Three things happened. 3️⃣

Number one, 1️⃣ we had an ⚡historical storm ⛈here where some parts of town were shut down for over 10 days with no electricity, neighbours stopped and were helping other neighbours deal with the damage that we add here in our city.

It put the real estate market on ice❄️, which is okay. 

Everybody kicked in and did help. We actually did sell a house in the dark with a flashlight. It was amazing. 

Second thing that happened, we had a provincial election. Ottawa is a government city. Whether it's a municipal provincial or federal action, real estate always goes on ice.❄️

When there's election, we don't like change. We're very conservative in nature. 

Thirdly, we had a mortgage change and the mortgage change was an interest rate hike.

Whenever that happens there's usually a pause ⏸and there's a 10-day hangover period. A period of adjustment⏯. We just went in to the second weekend in June and it's phenomenal.✅

Our Intel people were telling us, Greg, you're going to be busy next week. You're going to be busy this weekend. ✍

We had more traffic on our website within the weekend than we've had all year long for any individual weekend. 

We had a million people looking at our website and the first 4 months of the year, that's the total population. We get a lot of eyeballs.

Intel people said you're going to be busy. And we were, we had lots of traffic, lots of buyers were getting lots of leads on our website, buyers and sellers.

Buyer confidence is returning and it's returning quickly.

Everybody needs a roof over their head. Everybody needs a house to live in. The rental market is diminished of unavailability.

People are looking at what they can buy. 

We're looking at interest rates that are four and a half or less, variables you're under three compared to the U.S which is already at 5.5. It talks about going to 6.

Now don't get me wrong, interest rates are going to go up here in Ottawa. They're supposed to go up two and three more times.

If they do, it'll slow things down again, but it's not affecting pricing because there are just not enough homes to buy in Ottawa.

The crisis continues. Buyer confidence is returning↩️.

What happens, in that case, is buyers want to move quickly, get ahead of those interest rate hikes, lock in for five years if you can or get a variable rate that you're comfortable with.☮

Sellers understand that affordability is going to be a factor, more buyers can afford your home today.

My name is Greg Hamre from RE/MAX Affiliates in Ottawa, and Hamre Real Estate Team.

We're out in the community and in your neighbourhood. You'll see our signs throughout Ottawa. We know Ottawa. That's actually our website.✅

Hope to see you soon. Take care.