VANCOUVER (NEWS1130) – Hundreds of people are expected to gather at the Vancouver Art Gallery later today to protest the high cost of real estate in the city.

An online campaign with the hashtag ‘Don’t Have A Million‘ is going viral with young, educated professionals posting pictures of what they feel is their inability to get into the market.

Organizer Eveline Xia says prices are unrealistic for most. “You know a townhouse is $900,000 right and condos go for at least $500,000. The point now is to focusing on affordability in general, why is it that housing is so expensive? Why is it that so many people are leaving?”

The rally starts at noon.

BETHANY LINDSAY (VANCOUVER SUN)  Buyers continued to snatch up homes in Metro Vancouver last month, and realtors are warning that the region’s real estate demand is outpacing the supply.

The number of all types of residential property sales last month was up 37 per cent over April 2014 to 4,179, according to the Real Estate Board of Greater Vancouver. Meanwhile, the number of new listings was down 0.9 per cent compared to a year earlier.

“The supply of homes for sale today in the region is not meeting the demand we're seeing from home buyers. This is putting upward pressure on prices, particularly in the detached home market," Darcy McLeod, the real estate board’s president, said in a news release.

“It’s a competitive and fast-moving market today that is tilted in favour of home sellers.”

A total of 12,436 greater Vancouver homes are currently listed for sale on the Multiple Listing Service, down 0.5 per cent from March’s numbers and 19.8 per cent since April 2014.

Meanwhile, the so-called benchmark price for a typical residential property in Metro Vancouver now sits at $673,000, according to the real estate board. That’s an 8.5-per-cent increase over a year ago. The benchmark price for a detached home is set at $1.079 million, up 12.5 per cent over April 2014.