Nearly anyone who’s been to Montreal will rave about the city, but when it comes to old-world charm there is no big city in La Belle Provence that can compare to Quebec City. Indeed, if you read pretty much any tour guide it will tell you that if you’re going to make a trip to Quebec and Montreal you really owe it to yourself to visit Quebec City too. Those charms will be something that Quebec City locals don’t value quite the way they did in their youth, or when they first moved to the city. But they will still know of them and appreciate the city’s unique character, and they may well have factored into those newer residents moving there. This leads to us looking at real estate strategies in Quebec.
And the reason for that being because these days so many more people than ever before are looking at the local Quebec City real estate market. These may existing homeowners who are considering selling and moving elsewhere in the city. Or it may be others who are potential homebuyers and ready to work with a real estate agent who can lend their expertise who can narrow the list of possible properties that they’ll be viewing in the near future. The one constant is that there are going to be far more realtors looking to work with those clients than there are clients themselves. In that way Quebec City is no different from any other popular big city in Canada.
Agents need to be doing everything they can to be getting leads in advance of their competitors, and when it comes to real estate lead generation in Quebec many of those agents are seeing paid real estate leads as the best way of doing that. A good number of them have already signed up with us and are benefitting from their monthly quota of buyer and / or seller leads and of course the big advantage is that each lead will go to ONE realtor only. These agents are paying for the advantage of being put in touch with would-be clients before they have a chance to be introduced to a realtor by any other means.
All these realtors will need to learn how to convert leads into clients, but if you’re even somewhat capable with that then there is a lot to be said for a paid real estate leads service in Canada. But lead generation for real estate agents in Quebec needs to involve more than just one approach if agents are to have the level of ever-greater success they want to have with their career and as they aim to grow their PREC and make a good living for themselves. So what we’ll do with this blog entry is talk specifically about what agents can do to stay ahead in Quebec City’s real estate market, with client lead generation being a part of that focus.
Similar Focus
As we have stressed there are no marked differences between real estate strategies Quebec and the ones that would apply for other provinces and major metro regions in Canada. According to reliable industry data there were 90,369 residential sales recorded province-wide in 2024. This indicates a level of market activity that was higher than the historical average and similar to sales levels recorded in 2018 and 2019.
The gradual reduction of interest rates and a resurgence of consumer confidence definitely played their parts in pushing this trend. Experienced buyers were actively entering the market in large numbers and in the fall a good number of first-time buyers were joining them.
November sales were up 46% in the Quebec City area compared to the same period the previous year, and that made it one of the most dynamic months seen in the market across decades. For December of that year they were up by 52% compared to the same month last year.
Having the Bank of Canada’s key interest rate go down was a big positive contributor to all of this too. After holding steady at 5% for several months, the key rate began to gradually decline in June 2024 and was down to 3.25% by December. This was expected and it was welcomed by many households across Quebec, especially with homeowners who had mortgage renewals coming up. First-time buyers would have also been pleased with it, and many of whom had been holding off buying while waiting for more favourable mortgage rates.
Property prices across Quebec continued to evolve throughout 2024. Last year the median price of single-family homes in Quebec was $450,000, and that was an 8% increase compared to the prior year. Condominiums and small income properties saw increases of 5% and 12% too, reaching median prices of $378,000 and $585,000. For many Quebec households the outlook for this year was much more positive for real estate.The market recovery during the third and fourth quarters of 2024 have been precursors to an early and vibrant spring in the market.
Should current trends continue we are likely to see transactions continue to grow, bolstered by the recent drop in mortgage rates that encourages more buyers to enter the market. The inventory of available properties is expected to remain constrained and even if listings increase it is going to be a case of supply still falling short of meeting demand, especially in the single-family home segment. Any time there is an ongoing shortage of available homes there will be continued pressure on the market and median home prices are going to go up.
Eager Buyers, Too Few Homes
All of this is paired with the pace of new home development still being too slow to restore supply in 2025. Estimates at the start of this year were that there could be nearly 52,00 housing starts in 2025, but nearing the halfway point that hasn’t come to be and the growth in single-family homes and condominiums is only showing a 4% increase to this point. Lead generation for real estate agents Quebec becomes even more pressing when there are not enough homes on the market to meet to demand. Clients who want to buy a home but can’t find one they can afford never have the opportunity to become leads for an agent.
This scarcity of new constructions will continue to put pressure on prices and create a competitive environment for buyers, who will need to make an offer quickly to secure a property. We should keep in mind here that home prices are expected to keep rising in the coming months and years, and again this is primarily due to an ongoing shortage of housing supply. The 7% increase in property prices for Quebec that was forecast by Royal LePage for 2025 seems to be on track to be accurate as we approach the end of Q2 for the year.
That is something that also pushes the appeal of working in real estate in Quebec City, and in order to bring as many potential clients as possible into the sales funnel an agent needs to be taking a multi-prong approach to real estate lead generation in Quebec. They need to be standing out in the crowd as best as possible, and this means doing more than only going down traditional marketing avenues and having ads here and there introducing themselves as a local realtor.
Where agents can REALLY make themselves more visible to prospective clients is with social media marketing for real estate agents. If you’re an agent who is not social media savvy what you can do it hire someone to manage social media platforms and ensure you’re active in the right way. And what’s means by that is making it so that you’re seen by people who may be ready to buy or sell a home in Quebec City, and then also increasing the likelihood that you come across as an expert with the local market. Which will make you someone who they are going to be more inclined to work with.
We’ve talked about how real estate strategies for Quebec aren’t different than the ones for any other area of Canada. However, it goes without saying that if you are going to be active on social media platforms and promoting yourself as a real estate agent here you will get a lot more out of your efforts if you are communicating in French. This may be less of an issue in Montreal, but in other parts of the Province – including Quebec City – it’s better to be posting in French. This is something to consider as you start to make efforts to get more clients in real estate, and being bilingual is always going to be hugely advantageous with lead generation for real estate agents Quebec.
If paid real estate leads are something you want to add to your arsenal as you aim to build your client base with much more speed then you can sign up for Real Estate leads and immediately starting receiving a monthly quote of leads that are going to be delivered to you, and you only. The exclusive nature of these leads is important, and so with that we’ll wrap up for this week and say Bonne Chance to all of you working as realtors in Quebec City. Bring Back the Nordiques!
