Condo? Most Kamloops, Okanagan home buyers still want single-family homes
The push in many cities, but especially the rapidly growing Kelowna, is for higher density housing in condos and fourplexes.
But the vast majority of those searching for homes online in the region prefer stand-alone houses.
“When the pandemic hit, online house-hunting and virtual touring became the norm,” a study by international real estate portal Point2 Homes says. “Home-seekers embraced technology more than ever and educated themselves to anticipate future needs and prepare for scenarios that they hadn’t previously considered.”
Of those searching online, the largest portion, 44%, was the millennial generation (aged 25 to 44), the report says.
The company analyzed those who searched their online Point2Homes.com site then, at the request of iNFONews.ca, broke out findings for Kamloops, Kelowna, Penticton and Vernon.
More than 70% of searches in Kamloops and Vernon were for houses. That dropped closer to 60% in Kelowna and Penticton (exact percentages were not supplied).
Kelowna had the highest proportion of searchers looking for condos at 28.9%.
By comparison, in Richmond, Vancouver and Surrey, 51% to 57% of searches were for houses.
Burnaby was the only Canadian city Point2 studied where the majority of searches, 60%, were for condos.
Throughout the Thompson-Okanagan region, people tended to search for homes of 1,000 to 2,000 square feet with more than two bedrooms and two to three bathrooms. Most were for homes priced at less than the national average of $640,000.
In three of the cities, the most popular price range was $400,000 to $500,000 but Vernon searchers were more in the $500,000 to $600,000 range.
That’s a similar pattern to the Lower Mainland where Vancouver and Surrey buyers looked in the lower price range while people from Richmond and Burnaby moved up to the $600,000 range, the report says.
Nationally, the most searched price range was between $200,000 and $300,000.
The full survey, which doesn’t include Kamloops or the Okanagan, can be seen here.
READ MORE: Putting 'slumping' Kamloops, Okanagan real estate prices into perspective
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