September 2011 | Salt Spring Island Market Analysis

September, 2011.

Salt Spring Real Estate Market Update

As we are daily reminded: the only constant in life is change.

It’s also true that in change lies opportunity.

Our post-Internet time has obliterated time and so there is both no time, as in time famine, and also always time, as in never off.

With the search engine never asleep, and anything you want to know just a keystroke away, the power of the search now resides with the searcher…that means the consumer, in a sales situation.

Switzerland

Switzerland via NASA (and flickr.com)

This has huge impact on all real estate in secondary home/discretionary areas, where the Internet has erased both time and geography, and where someplace is now in competition with everyplace…it becomes essential to market the area itself as well as the property located there.

someplace is now in competition with everyplace…

This encourages time lags in decision-making…the buyer has to first discover the area, then visit, then think about what it means to his/her lifestyle, compare it to other options, and then has to focus in on the actual properties of potential interest in the chosen area.

Time is a factor..,perhaps a purchase will take from one to five years in a discretionary area. If it seems to happen more quickly, it may simply mean that the buyer has already been through the above process, may be back for a third “look”, with months between visits, when suddenly a desired property comes on the market, at same time. That can happen!

Patience plus international marketing is the key for secondary home/discretionary/resort based regions..,and globally so.

We are now residing in Marshall McLuhan’s “global village”…a local buyer for a Gulf Island property might come out of Vancouver or Calgary or San Francisco or Toronto or Shanghai or Sidney or Auckland or London or Bern or..,you get the drift! “Local” doesn’t mean in your own backyard, anymore.

Throw in up or down market trends, currency valuations, deflation/inflation arguments…and there’s more “time lag” components!

Over time, an investment in a secondary home/discretionary area will appreciate…it’s a “long tail” investment, though, never a fix & flip.

As soon as a consumer is in charge of a process, time is a companion in a sales situation.

More info? Call me! And your thoughts are? Always welcome!

How may I help you buy your special Salt Spring Island or Southern Gulf Islands opportunity?

Call me!