Vancouver market was in trouble before the rule changes

The rule changes (and Europe, for some odd reason, not China) have been getting the pre-emptive narrative blame for what is going to be a painful crash in the Canadian housing market.

But for the record, Vancouver's market has turned well into bearish mode already. Nails meet coffin.

VHB on Vancouvercondo.info via Vancouverpeak.com provides these running statistics.

For June 2012:
Sell-list so far 44.1%
Projected month-end sell-list 44.3%
MONTHS OF INVENTORY
Inventory as of June 21, 2012 19346
Current MoI at this sales pace 7.98

Anything over 6.5 months is contractive to pricing. Now solid buyer's market.

How serious is a sell-list ratio of 44%?
Here's the last ten years of Junes:
year sell list sell/list
2002 2689 3850 69.8%
2003 3525 4301 82.0%
2004 3501 5594 62.6%
2005 4333 4742 91.4%
2006 3951 5460 72.4%
2007 4244 5533 76.7%
2008 2425 6546 37.0%
2009 4259 5372 79.3%
2010 2972 5544 53.6%
2011 3262 5793 56.3%
Mean 3516 5274 66.7%
median 3513 5496.5 72.4%

The only worse year for an imbalance in supply and demand: 2008. This is not a balanced market, it is a teetering one  And the kicker: Inventory has been building all year and with the rule changes is poised to make 2008 look like a cake-walk.

Let's be careful out there, people.

Thanks to b5baxter for keeping the inventory graph updated.