After plummeting to lows not seen since the 1980s, Vancouver's Lower Mainland real estate markets saw a rush in the second half of 2009 that pushed sales well above an economically challenged 2008.

Aided by the slashing of mortgage rates new buyers have been pouring into the market. The recovery wasn’t equally shared among Lower Mainland municipalities, but Robyn Adamache, a market analyst for Canada Mortgage and Housing Corp.,said most communities are in seller’s market conditions.  

“Prices are expected to continue rising as well,” Adamache said. 

The area of Metro covered by the Real Estate Board of Greater Vancouver recorded 35,669 sales through the realtor-controlled Multiple Listing Service in 2009, a 45-per-cent increase from 2008.  

And the benchmark price, an average price for the typical property sold, hit $562,463 in December, up some 16 per cent from December 2008, when prices had fallen considerably from their peak. 

Adamache noted that the number of listings in Vancouver amounts to just over a three months’ supply at the current pace of sales, a far cry from the 10 months’ supply in the market in December of 2008.