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Olympia Trencevski, general manager at the St. Albert Centre, has accepted a new position in Edmonton and will leaving St. Albert later this month.

Olympia Trencevski, general manager at the St. Albert Centre, has accepted a new position in Edmonton and will leaving St. Albert later this month.

“It is impossible to thank each and every one of you enough, for your leadership, guidance, assistance, partnership, support and friendship,” she wrote in an email to friends and acquaintances earlier this month.

“I feel extremely privileged to be part of this amazing community, I am absolutely enamoured by the dedication and the commitment all of you have in your city, in your businesses, work and with your families, and I will carry that forward with me, I can assure you,” she said.

Trencevski said her new position, as general manager of Edmonton City Centre, will allow her to grow while still working in the shopping centre industry.

“Everybody has been a dream to work with. I will take all that with me, going forward in my life and I hope that my friendships that have been formed here in the community, I know they will continue into the future,” she said.

Trencevski will begin her new role on November 10. She said staff at St. Albert Centre have not found a replacement for her.

All residential-average prices dropped three per cent in October, according to the Realtors Association of Edmonton, which puts them on par with prices at this time last year.

“Prices this fall are matching almost dollar for dollar with prices for the past two years. But I am pleased to report that the inventory dropped 10.6 per cent in October, and as it returns to a more normal level, prices will start to move,” said association president Larry Westergard.

St. Albert saw more of a disparity in single-family home prices between 2009 and 2010, compared to Edmonton. The average price of a single-family home last month was $448,534, compared to $436,588 in 2009. In 2008, the average price of a single-family home was $441,308.

Average condominium prices in St. Albert also dropped significantly between October 2009 and October 2010. Last month, the average price of a condo in the city was $262,640, compared to $280,530 last October and $246,059 in 2008.

Albertans who completed a renovation since 2008 are better at budgeting for home renovations and at paying them off, according to RBC’s 2010 Home Renovation Survey.

The survey found that 70 per cent of Albertans who have completed renovations since 2008 have paid them off, compared with a national average of 60 per cent.

Homeowners in Alberta also beat out other provinces when it came to staying on their renovation budget at 60 per cent, compared to a 49 per cent across Canada.

The poll also found that the number of people planning renovations has declined over the past two years while 58 per cent of Alberta homeowners are planning to renovate within the next two years.

Four-in-10 Albertans (41 per cent) have lived in their current homes for more than a decade and one-third (37 per cent) expect to remain there for at least the next 10 years. Half (51 per cent) of Alberta residents indicated that if their home required major renovations and they had a choice, they would rather renovate than sell and move.

Confidence among small and medium business owners jumped almost six points last month, according to a survey by the Canadian Federation of Independent Business (CFIB).

In Alberta, confidence levels increased 5.9 points from 65.7 in September to 71.6 in October.

“It’s a relief to see optimism rebound in Alberta after an extended slide. We’ll be watching the results from the next survey closely to see if October’s numbers are a blip or the start of a meaningful upward trend,” said CFIB’s Alberta director, Richard Truscott, in a statement.

Optimism levels in finance, realty, hospitality, transportation and agriculture remain relatively depressed but business owners in manufacturing, resources, wholesale and retail are more upbeat than in previous surveys, according to the CFIB.

Confidence levels are measured on a scale between 0 and 100, with an index level above 50 meaning that owners are expecting a stronger business performance in the next year.

According to past results, index levels normally range between 65 and 75 when the economy is growing.

The findings are based on 835 responses, collected from a random sample of CFIB members, to a controlled-access web survey.

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