Home sales in Steinbach were down about five per cent last year from 2016. Peter Squire of the Multiple Listing Service office in Winnipeg says it was something they predicted would happen because of the new stress test on insured mortgages for first-time home buyers. He gives us the numbers for sales of single detached homes.

"There were 460 sales in 2016 and 437 in 2017. The thing that I noted was there was a drop off in listings of quite a few. So, with fewer listings, in some cases, buyers were not finding some homes they would have bought if there had been more."

Squire notes the average selling price of single detached homes continued upward last year, rising by $7,000 from the previous year to $276,000.

"That to me indicates there's still strong demand. There were fewer listings to choose from, yet the ones that were sold were doing well and there was a higher average sale price."

Squire notes the decline in sales was not unexpected.

"We did predict some of that based on the fact that there was a new stress test that the federal government brought in on insured mortgages which affects more the first-time home buyer market and really those properties under $300,000."

Despite the small decline, Squire says Steinbach remains the busiest MLS market in the province followed by Waverley West in Winnipeg.

Squire says there were 53 condo sales in Steinbach in 2017, up six from 2016.