I have a sister in Wpg, MB. She and her husband have downsized from their 2500+ sq ft home to a 1000 sq ft home. Kids grown up and on their own. It is a sellers market. They took over a year to find a used home they liked at a price they could handle. The listings / sale are done differently from what we are used to.

The houses are listed on MLS and a final offer date is set. Anyone interested in the house must put in a bid, their best offer along with a deposit. The seller then opens and reads all the offers with their agent and picks the one they like best. There can be ties and then run off bids. Winning bids seldom have any conditions attached. My sister ans husband offered thousands over the listing price for the home they wanted. They won.

Their old home had already been cleaned and brought to looking its best. They put it on the market at a reasonable / market price within weeks of closing on their new one. A month later on "open the bids" day they had 7 offers. The winner paid $40K over the listing price of and gave a $50K deposit. No conditions on the agreement; no need to fix this or that. $400K price range. They came out of the deal with great profits. Trip to Ireland is in the works.

OTOH friends here were selling a similar house and the conditions list included things like new batteries for the smoke detectors. Lengthy list, too. And it was about half the cost for about the same amount of house.

What an interesting way to buy and sell property! Property is a unique purchase and not at all a commodity - it's certainly not like buying toothpaste. Maybe that's why it's called Real Estate - it is very real, very grounded, and lives in both the earth and the history of the land.

I'm in Montreal, Quebec.  When you find something you like you place a bid but have no clue if over bids exist or not, and how much they were for.  Same idea where they have x days to reply to your bid or counteroffer...  and you can't place an offer on another one until they reply.  Kind of sucks that way. 

We bought our first home about 10 years ago for what we thought was way too much ($160k range).  We sold it 8 years later for $120k more than we paid.  Bought the house we are in now 2 years ago.  I had a fit when I saw the evaluation go up this year by $90k... figured the taxes would also go up a crazy amount but wound up being only $60 or so.  Called our real-estate agent and she said the house can really go for that and maybe more... 

The markets are crazy around here.  Every time you think there is no room to go up the market surprises you.  Then I look at listings in upper NY state (Malone, Chateaugay, etc) and I see decent houses going for as little as $20k needing some work, $40 totally livable.  Such a drastic difference between the markets.  With the prices so cheap in the states, I am wondering if building is even worth it anymore, cost less to buy and fix up than to build from scratch... but then you lose out on all the fun. 

I have read recently that housing costs in Canada are through the roof.

http://www.cbc.ca/news/business/house-prices-jump-another-10-to-406-372-1.2575498

http://crea.ca/content/national-average-price-map

I have wondered what the house we sold in 1985 in Winnipeg would now sell for so I did some googling. We sold a 832 sq ft house built in the 1950's on a 50 ft wide x 95 deep lot, with a basement for $35K in 1985. Basements are slightly short on headroom... maybe 6'6" under the center beam. We moved to NM and bought a 1550 sq ft home on a slab for $55K, brand new build, lot size 75 x 175 feet. Homes on the same street back home in Wpg are now selling for $175 - $185K on a 25 ft wide lot. Our NM home could likely bring in $180K

The real estate market in Saskatchewan doing okay but I haven't heard about any crazy bidding wars. Saskatoon is next door to Winnipeg (in Canada, next door means an 8 hr car trip). We bought a 1,070 sq. ft house, partially finished basement, on a 45' x 120' lot four years ago. We got it for $333K. I suspect it would be worth up to $375K these days. Calgary is next door to Saskatoon (again, 6 hrs by car) and the prices there are even more absurd. Don't get me started on house prices in Vancouver.

You can travel around the continent and buy the same house for a wildly different price.