Nova Scotia Home sales rise in Q3
Residential sales and listings were up across the province in the third quarter, according to figures released Friday by the Nova Scotia Association of Realtors.
From July to September there were 1,583 homes sold in the Halifax-Dartmouth area, an increase of 12 per cent from the same period last year. That is in line with the provincial average increase of 11.2 per cent. Listings went up by 11.7 percent in the Halifax region and 10.5 per cent provincially.
The biggest sales increases were registered in Yarmouth (62.2 per cent), Cape Breton (24.7 per cent) and the South Shore (20.4 per cent)
The numbers are likely to increase further in the next two years as work ramps up on the $25-billion contract awarded to Irving-owned Halifax Shipyard on Wednesday, he said.
“And it will not be felt just in the HRM and those areas like Bridgewater and Windsor and up the Eastern Shore, It will transcend that,” Faulkner said. “I think it will affect Eastern Canada generally, most of Nova Scotia specifically and certainly the HRM area.”
Meanwhile, the effect of the contract will also be felt on the various commercial real estate asset classes, including retail, industrial and land investment, said Robert Musset, senior vice-president at CB Richard Ellis Ltd. In Atlantic Canada.
“There´s certainly going to be office demand, there´s certainly going to be residential and housing demand on every level,” he said.
“I think we will start seeing some of the impact on the near term as people get organized and obviously the bigger effects will be more significant as the project moves forward.”
Bill MacAvoy, the director of Cushman and Wakefield´s Atlantic affiliate, said the commercial real estate industry will see tangible effects in the next 18 to 24 months.
“I think generally it´s going to do something positive for all asset classes, the degree of which will take some time to see,” he said. “And it will fluctuate over the period of the contract but I think, generally, it´s going to increase the demand for certain on industrial space, on office space, performance of retail and hotels will go up.”
He said the contract announcement has been noticed by outsiders who now want to get a piece of the Halifax pie.
“There will undoubtedly, and it’s already started, be calls from investors from other markets looking to secure multi-family assets or industrial assets in this market, because they believe that the demand will be greater than it´s been historically,” he said.
