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Calgary and Edmonton will take over as the fastest growing metros for office jobs during 2023-27

We forecast that over the medium term the fastest growing of the 10 major metros in terms of office-based employment will be the Albertan pair, Calgary and Edmonton. Together they account for 10% of national office-based jobs—so about the same as Vancouver. While we foresee some divergence away from oil- dependency in both of these metros, that process will be slow. Strong office-based employment growth (4.9% per year in Calgary, and 3.2% per year in Edmonton), is in both cases associated with high wages in these strongly growing local economies helping to attract large numbers of potential workers from elsewhere, thereby enabling all sectors to successfully fill vacancies over the next five years. We forecast population growth among the 15 to 64 age-group of 2.1% in Calgary and 2.0% in Edmonton over the next five years, compared to just 0.9% per year nationally.
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Also check this out:

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From: https://www.oxfordeconomics.com/resource/office-based-job-gains-to-slow-across-canadian-metros/
 
So let me get this straight:

For cities of 500,000+ population in Canada, Edmonton in 2022 was #1 for GDP growth and #3 for median household income (and was nearly tied with Calgary for 2nd), yet has the 2nd cheapest housing.

Now we're almost 3/4 the way through 2023 with the highest national population boom in decades and real estate here has really yet to have any significant increase. It's genuinely bewildering how detached the economics of our real estate market is from literally every other major urban centre in Canada.
 
So let me get this straight:

For cities of 500,000+ population in Canada, Edmonton in 2022 was #1 for GDP growth and #3 for median household income (and was nearly tied with Calgary for 2nd), yet has the 2nd cheapest housing.

Now we're almost 3/4 the way through 2023 with the highest national population boom in decades and real estate here has really yet to have any significant increase. It's genuinely bewildering how detached the economics of our real estate market is from literally every other major urban centre in Canada.
We know how to build houses here. Plenty of supply to go around- that's the key difference. As long as city council doesn't mess that up. Supports strong economic and population growth.
 
We know how to build houses here. Plenty of supply to go around- that's the key difference. As long as city council doesn't mess that up. Supports strong economic and population growth.

I'd argue they know how to build houses in Calgary and Montreal, both formerly affordable cities like Edmonton that are creeping up in price. It's really only Southwest BC and Southern Ontario that are strongly restricted by greenbelts.
 
We know how to build suburban greenfield housing. Calgary was overwhelmed by demand, a lot of it for multi family closer to the core.
 
We know how to build houses here. Plenty of supply to go around- that's the key difference. As long as city council doesn't mess that up. Supports strong economic and population growth.

The city DID mess that up with tens of millions of dollars gone 'poof' in central neighbourhoods. Valuation erosion, massive write downs, refinancing and that's only on the commercial side. Using my condo building alone, it has lost ~25-30% of its value or ~$3,000,000.00 and the only reason folks aren't screaming is due to the original value from 2005.

I'd bet that owners in Falcon, Icon and even Encore are down similar values with tens of millions of dollars lost because of the real estate market, excess 'cheap' supply and a lack of demand for Downtown properties.

Bravo!
 
We know how to build suburban greenfield housing. Calgary was overwhelmed by demand, a lot of it for multi family closer to the core.

They still have a lot of sprawl being built... but also considerably more infill too.
 
Edmonton is still primarily a SFH market, and those have done well over the last 10 years. Many people in Vancouver and Toronto would buy houses too, but they've been pushed into condos as a more affordable option. I don't think Edmonton is going to have a robust condo market until SFH become much more expensive in the core areas. We're moving in that direction, but there is still a lot of supply.
 
The value proposition and requirement for many to only consider condos is not there and that's very true, but neither is our urban experience; that's a shame.
 
So let me get this straight:

For cities of 500,000+ population in Canada, Edmonton in 2022 was #1 for GDP growth and #3 for median household income (and was nearly tied with Calgary for 2nd), yet has the 2nd cheapest housing.

Now we're almost 3/4 the way through 2023 with the highest national population boom in decades and real estate here has really yet to have any significant increase. It's genuinely bewildering how detached the economics of our real estate market is from literally every other major urban centre in Canada.
It took years for excess demand and not enough supply to create the horrible mess it has elsewhere. Here it has been the opposite for a long time.

However, if growth and demand here continues to be strong, the excess supply built up over the last decade or so of slow growth will be used up.

When that happens, things could change here very quickly. Especially if there is continued or more pressure with people moving here from more unaffordable places (which are most other larger cities and provinces in Canada).
 
We have literally no growth boundaries. On top of that we have a regional approach to growth that doesn't always mean Edmonton is in charge. So despite record in-migration prices stay stagnant or even have been dropping.
 
Also my guess is that single family has done a lot better than multifamily if you singled it out. Might be more comparable to other markets.
 

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