Red Deer’s home resale market enjoyed a fast start to 2013, with 99 Multiple Listing Service sales recorded during the first month of the year.
That was 15 per cent ahead of the tally for the same period in 2012, when there were 86 sales.
It was also 19 per cent higher than the figure for December 2012, which had 83 residential sales.
The January statistics, which were issued by the Central Alberta Realtors Association on Monday, also revealed that there were 114 home sales in the surrounding region covered by the association.
That marked a 10 per cent slide from the 127 sales a year earlier. But it represented a 44 per cent rebound from the 79 sales in January 2012.
The average home selling price in Red Deer last month was $317,919.
That was 5.5 per cent higher that the average of $301,272 in January 2012, and a 12.2 per cent improvement over the $283,381 a year earlier.
Outside Red Deer, the January average was $242,735 — a 5.6 per cent decline from $257,221 for the same month last year, and 7.3 per cent lower than the $261,894 average in December.
The Central Alberta Realtors Association has cautioned against relying on average prices as an indicator of market trends, because they include homes of all types and from a variety of neighbourhoods.
The association processed 486 new listings in January, with 198 in Red Deer and 288 outside the city.
That compared with 564 for the same month in 2012, when there were 197 in Red Deer and 367 in the outlying region.
In December there were 211 new listings: 84 in Red Deer and 127 outside.