1 - Having good amenities does not necessarily mean luxury. To my view, Edmonton has barely any luxury condos, even those who position themselves as such. I'd say maybe the JW Residences, the Pearl and MAYBE a handful of other buildings scattered between Grandin, Oliver and Downtown. What we have are overpriced good quality condos and a terrible mismatch between the offered quality, prices and demand, which keeps propelling people who could be interested in condos to buy houses in greenfield developments.
2 - There are a few condos proposed and/or expected in DT, for 2022. This include some developments that have been approved or proposed before the pandemic, like the Hudson, and some we already know are happening, like The Parks. There is also hope that the Tower BG will break ground, or at least a timeframe will be announced.
3 - Tying on point 1: as more developments, with higher quality get built, there is a tendency that the price points lower for the lower/average quality ones, as the reference point changes. Right now, our stock of condos in the central region is mostly comprised of older, 60s to 90s buildings, with very feel amenities, if any at all. This means that buildings that are pretty much average, or slight above average, on most markets similar do Edmonton in North America, are being sold as luxury condos here. As they become the norm, or at least more common (and their prices drop given the lackluster demand, given current prices), I can easily see demand rising, especially as we begin to see more family oriented units (3bdrm and townhomes).
4 - Part of the low demand can be explained by the current lack of amenities in the area. We're still waiting for a grocery store in the core (soon to be corrected) and we need at least one hardware store, to say the least, we also need entertainment that isn't pubs or oilers games (a Rec Room would do wonders for DT). If I need to drive 5-10 blocks to buy groceries, 15 minutes to buy nails to hang paintings or half an hour to a movie theatre or any entertainment , then living in the core is less convenient than it should, as much as I might enjoy the lifestyle, and that will push me towards other places: either condos/apartments in Oliver or houses if I really want a condo (my case) or a house in a soulless wasteland we like to call residential suburbs. People who choose to live DT will be looking for convenience, and I'd bet a good amount of money that there will be much more demand once we start providing such amenities.
We also need to have EPS and the CoE to work on safety and upkeep, although this is a problem much bigger and that also affects businesses and rentals.
The current lack of demand for condos in Edmonton is much less related to the lack of people preferring condos do houses, and much more related to the overpriced units and lack of amenities (both in the buildings and in the area). We'll only be able to assess the actual balance of demand between condos and houses once we have more condos entering the market competitively, either with higher quality of lower prices.
