About Ajax's Eagle Ridge

In general, I will tell my clients that the weather sometimes will affect the market, particularly in the winter when looking at houses means trudging through snow banks and slush. The weather seemed a little confused in January. Maybe the home buyers were too.

There were 6 sales in the Eagle Ridge area of Pickering Village. The detached 4 bedroom homes sold for a median price of $445,000.

Home sellers can sit back with their hot chocolate. This high demand area has great opportunities for buyers and sellers to move up this year.

Looking at the national papers or even some of the more local papers, you might be thinking that the real estate market is a mess. The US housing market is in the tank and the Alberta Market is booming. Wait, the market in the US is not so bad according to the National Association of Realtors; the Alberta market has been skidding to a stall.

You really need to wade through the quagmire to find the answers as to whether now is the time to put your home in Pickering Village on the market and what would that price be.

Here is the low-down about your neighbourhood to help you make good decisions:

For 2007, the average price of detached homes in Eagle Ridge, Pickering Village:

• 3 bedrooms: $378,004
• 4 bedrooms: $414,192
• 5 bedrooms: $608,333

Want to know how your real estate investment has done since you bought your home 4 years ago? Here is the trend for the prices of 3 and 4 bedrooms (there have not been enough 5 bedrooms sales to affect the price):

• 2003 - $360,078
• 2004 - $399,464 - up 9.9%
• 2005 - $382,451 - down 4.3%
• 2006 - $414,911 - up 7.8%
• 2007 - $403,883 - down 2.7%
  (Toronto Real Estate Board Statistics)

The art of trend-watching and pricing your home to sell requires knowledge about what is going on all around the real estate industry.