Royal LePage, the largest real estate company in Canada, recently surveyed their buyers and sellers to uncover what matters most in terms of the service they receive from their real estate professional. The results have important implications for both domestic and international real estate practitioners.

Phil Soper, the CEO of Royal LePage, was one of the keynotes at the Banff Western Connection 2013 Conference. After sharing an overview of the current state of the Canadian market, he turned his attention to the next generation of Canadian real estate purchasers including how they differ as well as their expectations regarding the services they receive.

According to Soper, “Everything is new and nothing has changed.”

Eddie LePage actually did the first “virtual tours” with movies back in the 1920s. Today’s consumer expects not only virtual tours, they also expect a media-rich experience. Television is “too single stream” for them. Digital assistants (increasingly small devices loaded with ever-increasing functionality) will shape our real estate buying and selling experiences in ways we can’t even imagine.

Spring has not yet arrived in the frozen northland, but the real estate market has felt like a spring market since the end of last year. It also feels like a seller’s market in several, but not all, neighborhoods. 

These past few weeks I am reminded of the strategies I used during the last seller’s market. Agents who have gotten their licenses in the last five to eight years may have never experienced a seller’s market.

If I had the technology during the last seller’s market that I enjoy today I could have sold so much more. I think that if I were working without all the latest gadgets and apps, the offers I have written in the last week or so never would have happened and, instead of writing this, I would still be dealing with “old school” paperwork.

There was this little house that was listed in the early afternoon and while I was waiting in front of a home for one of my motivated buyers, I got a text message from his wife alerting me that a home just came on the market that might be worth a look. She was at the airport with some time on her hands and used the time to check to see if any homes had come on the market while she was in the air.

Mortgages rates slipped this week, even as the S&P 500 Index and the Dow Jones Industrial hovered around record highs.

The reported decline comes just a day after a Federal Reserve official said that the Fed could begin to wind down its stimulus program as early as this summer and end it altogether sometime late this year.

Rates on 30-year fixed-rate mortgages averaged 3.54 percent with an average 0.8 point for the week ending April 4th, down from 3.57 percent last week, and 3.98 percent a year ago, Freddie Mac said in releasing the results of its latest Primary Mortgage Market Survey. Rates on 30-year fixed-rate loans hit a low in Freddie Mac records dating to 1971 of 3.31 percent during the week ending Nov. 21, 2012.

Consulting firm AIM Group has released its annual real estate report that assesses real estate marketing practices around the world.

The “2013 Real Estate Advertising Annual” explores the business models and advertising tactics of about 90 companies in 29 countries, with a focus on “innovative services, products, payments and partnerships.” 

The report’s introduction mentions the following highlights: 

• SouFun in China issues a “platinum” club membership card that discounts the purchase prices of participating builders. Revenue from SouFun’s serviced e-commerce increased from $24 million in 2011 to $102 million in 2012. 
• In Spain, where property sales have yet to recover from the 2007 recession, Pisos.com refocused its business on flat-sharing, rentals and private sellers.
• Zillow in the U.S., which focuses on value-added services for agents and brokers, acquires what it doesn’t build and in 2012, the company’s revenue grew 77 percent over 2011. 
• Google Ventures-backed startup HomeLight matches buyers and agents, becoming a kind of “personal real estate concierge.”

When Fort Worth, Texas-based broker Greg Fischer decided to build a new website this year for his firm, he chose to leave search out of it.

The search technology available for his site was not good enough, cost too much and didn’t offer enough return on investment, Fischer said. Plus, his value as an agent had to do with relationships, not search, he said.

“Why would I dilute my brand in delivering subpar search?” Fischer said. “If I had Trulia’s search platform, I’d reconsider.”

His new site has pages featuring local neighborhoods and businesses with photos and a section highlighting the firm’s listings, but no search capability.

The highest tier of homes for sale, which has been the last part of the market to feel the effects of the housing recovery, is on the verge of switching from a buyers’ to a sellers’ market for first time in years.

The Institute for Luxury Home Marketing weekly market report today found that homes priced over $500,000 have reached a market action index of 29, one point below the level that typically indicates a sellers’ market because demand is high enough to quickly consume available supply.

The national median price in the ILHMI profile is $1,246,587 for an average asking price of $339 per square foot. The average days on market is 185 and falling. Some 23 percent of the luxury properties in the profile have had some sort of a price decrease while they have been listed, and 14 percent have been relisted.

Every one of ILHM’s 30 markets reports improving conditions. Shortest times on market were reported in Washington (135), Silicon Valley (139), San Francisco (148), Las Vegas (156), San Diego (165), Housont, (170), Austin (178), Atlanta (179), Boston (135) and Ventura (189).

Reports from markets around the nation confirm that sales are strong and inventories are getting tighter in the luxury sector. In the Denver area, buyers purchased up almost 37 percent more luxury single-family homes in February than they did in February 2012, according to a report by independent broker Gary Bauer. Bauer’s report, based on Metrolist data, showed that well-heeled consumers purchased 41 homes that cost at least $1 million last month, compared with 30 in February 2012. In January, 39 luxury homes sold, reported Inside Real Estate News.

The total dollar volume for luxury sales in February rose 30 percent to $57.5 million, compared with $44.25 million a year earlier. The dollar volume last month was up slightly from the $55.7 million in January.

Have real estate investments peaked? After years of growth during the Foreclosure Eva, investment purchases declined slightly last year after surging 64.5 percent in 2011. With the cost and competition to buy distress sales growing and prices for normal homes rising, will investors pull back and start cashing in their assets?

Despite multi-billion dollar buying sprees by well-funded Wall Street hedge funds, real estate investors bought fewer properties in 2012 than they did in 2011, which was a record year for investors. Investment-home sales declined 2.1 percent to 1.21 million from 1.23 million in 2011, but those sales had been well under a million during the market downturn. Owner-occupied purchases jumped 17.4 percent to 3.27 million last year from 2.79 million in 2011, according to an annual survey by the National Association of Realtors.

“Investors have been very active in the market over the past two years, attracted mostly by discounted foreclosures that could be quickly turned into profitable rentals,” said NAR’s Lawrence Yun. “With rising prices and limited inventory, notably in the low price ranges, investors are likely to step back in coming years.”

The price to be a real estate investor rose significantly last year. The median investment-home price was $115,000 in 2012, up 15.0 percent from $100,000 in 2011. All-cash purchases remain common in the investment market: half of investment buyers paid cash in 2012,. Forty-seven percent of investment homes purchased in 2012 were distressed homes. The median downpayment for both investment buyers was 27 percent, the same as in 2011.

Though investment buyers said they plan to hold the property for a median of 8 years, up from 5 years in 2011, indications are that changing economic conditions may put pressure on them to sell.

Six percent of homes purchased by investment buyers last year have already been resold, and another 8 percent are planned to be sold within a year. In the 2011 study, 5 percent of investment homes were already resold, and 8 percent were planned to be sold within a year.

“Property flipping modestly increased in in 2012,” Yun said. “However, this isn’t flipping in the sense of what took place during the housing boom. Rather, investors generally are renovating and improving properties before placing them back on the market to resell at a profit.”

Five Western states with the highest home price appreciation in February, Nevada (+19.3 percent), Arizona (+18.6 percent), California (+15.3 percent), Hawaii (+14.6 percent) and Idaho (+13.5 percent), led the nation to the biggest price increase in seven years.

Home prices nationwide, including distressed sales, increased 10.2 percent on a year-over-year basis in February 2013 compared to February 2012, the biggest year-over-year increase since March 2006 and the 12th consecutive monthly increase in home prices nationally, according to Corelogic’s February price report.

Excluding distressed sales, home prices increased on a year-over-year basis by 10.1 percent in February 2013 compared to February 2012. On a month-over-month basis, excluding distressed sales, home prices increased 1.5 percent in February 2013 compared to January 2013. Distressed sales include short sales and real estate owned (REO) transactions.

The CoreLogic Pending HPI indicates that March 2013 home prices, including distressed sales, are also expected to rise by 10.2 percent on a year-over-year basis from March 2012 and rise by 1.2 percent on a month-over-month basis from February 2013. Excluding distressed sales, March 2013 home prices are poised to rise 11.4 percent year over year from March 2012 and by 2.0 percent month over month from February 2013. The CoreLogic Pending HPI is a proprietary and exclusive metric that provides the most current indication of trends in home prices. It is based on Multiple Listing Service (MLS) data that measure price changes for the most recent month.

“The rebound in prices is heavily driven by western states. Eight of the top ten highest appreciating large markets are in California, with Phoenix and Las Vegas rounding out the list,” said Dr. Mark Fleming, chief economist for CoreLogic.