Why Are We Seeing Multiple Offers Again?!

The past 4 weeks or so, listings in all sorts of price ranges and neighbourhoods of the Fraser Valley and much of the Lower Mainland are seeing competing offers again! And we’re getting asked the question: with the cost of living so high, and interest rates limiting so many purchasers, how are competing offers happening?
It’s simple, and in my opinion unlikely to last long. We’re just coming a time of year (January-February) when there are traditionally very few listings coming on the market. This year has been, so far, an extreme in that way. Inventory is low and, if low enough, it can create competing offer situations amongst even a relatively small number of active and ready buyers. This is what we’re seeing now.  While there are a lot of hopeful buyers ‘waiting for prices to drop more’, the reality is that watching the market and being pre-approved for a mortgage and actively looking for a home are two different things. And the consensus we’re hearing from numerous friends in the mortgage industry is that there really aren’t many new pre-approval applications being received and processed. So, what this means is that as we head into the spring with instability in the market and expecting the traditional increase in number of new listings that usually begins to take place in March and lasts until around May, the number of listings on market could very quickly and significantly outnumber the buyers capable of purchasing them. And we are noticing signs of this beginning to take place as more sellers prepare to put homes onto the market.