Calgary’s luxury home resale market has taken a hit in 2015 with $1-million property transactions down 36 per cent from last year’s record level.

Sothebys International Realty Canada, in a market update Thursday, said “fluctuations in oil prices and continued economic uncertainty are expected to dampen Calgary’s high-end real estate market in the last six months of the year,” noting the NDP government’s fall provincial budget could also influence sales.

Its Top-Tier Real Estate Report shows 289 properties of $1 million or more sold in Calgary during the first six months of 2015.

A record 854 high-end homes sold last year, besting the previous records of 726 in 2013 and 544 in 2012.

“We’ve seen these cycles before … Most of our buyers have been through many of them,” said Ross McCredie, president and chief executive of Sotheby’s International Realty Canada.

McCredie said the market became more unsettled following the May provincial election that ushered in an NDP majority government.

“The election in some ways has probably thrown people for a loop more than anything else … I don’t think anybody really expected the NDP to get in and now that they’re in everybody’s just kind of like what does that mean because they’ve never had a change in government in so long.”

That uncertainty has led more Albertans to buy in Victoria and in the Okanagan again, he said.

“They’re still trying to figure out where the market is going to settle (in Calgary),” said McCredie.

The luxury home market has felt a bigger decline in sales this year compared with the overall MLS market in Calgary. According to the Calgary Real Estate Board, year-to-date until the end of June, there were 10,197 MLS sales in the city, a 26.4 per cent drop from the same 2014 period.

“Obviously there’s still a certain degree of economic uncertainty out there,” said Cliff Stevenson, president-elect for next year with CREB. “It’s difficult to compare these numbers to a record-breaking year in 2014. If we look at the 10-year average for year-to-date numbers January 1st to June 30th for the last 10 years, we’re actually performing better than the 10-year average.

Stevenson said there has been an improvement in activity in June but the economic uncertainty remains.

“There’s a lot of wait-and-see, sitting on the fence,” he said.

mtoneguzzi@calgaryherald.com

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