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Toronto single-family -19% from Feb 2022 peak, condos hit 3-year low. Vancouver eases further. Calgary condos sag. New highs in some markets.
By Wolf Richter for WOLF STREET.
Home prices in Canada dipped by 0.2% in December from November and were down 0.2% year-over-year, the ninth month in a row of year-over-year declines. They were down 17% from the crazy peak in March 2022 and back where they’d first been in September 2021, according to the not seasonally adjusted Canada MLS Home Price Index Composite released by the Canadian Real Estate Association (CREA) today. Condo prices overall were on even shakier ground than single-family dwellings.
Home sales in Canada fell by 5.8% in December from November, seasonally adjusted, after four months of increases, according to data from CREA today. But compared to the frozen volume in December a year ago, home sales were up by 19%.
New listings declined by 1.7% in December from November. But with sales falling faster than new listings, active listings rose by 2.0%, and supply increased to 3.9 months, the highest since September.
Everyone was hoping mortgage rates would plunge after the Bank of Canada’s aggressive rate cuts to 3.25% from 5.0%, starting in June, including two 50-basis-point cuts in October and December. They did drop at first, but then they rose.
As mortgages in Canada come mostly with variable rates or with rates that are fixed for short terms, such as two years or five years, the Canada five-year government bond yield matters a lot to the housing market, and it has risen by 40 basis points since September. This is not what the housing market expected from the two monster rate cuts in October and December.
But every market dances to its own drummer.
When we started this series many years ago to visually document the crazy home price surge in Canada — to accompany our series about the US housing market — we never expected these charts to become this absurd. But this was the era of money-printing and interest rate repression, and absurdities became the norm.
Greater Toronto Area, single-family MLS Home Price Benchmark Index:
- Month-to-month: unchanged, at $1,282,000; where it had first been in October 2021
- From peak in February 2022: -19.1%
- Year-over-year: +1.1%.
The three descending peaks occurred in February 2022, May 2023, and April 2024. The other housing-mania spike occurred in April 2017.
Greater Toronto Area, condo benchmark price:
- Month-to-month: -0.3% to $647,200, lowest since October 2021.
- From peak in April 2022: -17.5%
- Year-over-year: -3.7%, with year-over-year declines in 23 of the past 24 months.
Hamilton-Burlington metro single family benchmark price (part of the “Greater Toronto and Hamilton Area”):
- Month-to-month: -2.7% to $869,100, back to February 2021
- From peak in February 2022: -24.8%
- Year-over-year: +1.1%.
Hamilton-Burlington metro condo benchmark price:
- Month-to-month: -0.3% to $517,700, a new 3-year low, lowest since September 2021.
- From peak in April 2022: -18.2%
- Year-over-year: -4.1%.
Greater Vancouver single-family benchmark price:
- Month-to-month: -0.1%, at $1,994,600, about where it had been in January 2022.
- From peak in April 2022: -4.8%
- Year-over-year: +1.9%.
Greater Vancouver condo benchmark price:
- Month-to-month: -0.4%, to $749,900, below February 2022.
- From high in April 2024: -3.6%.
- Year-over-year: -0.1%, sixth year-over-year decline in a row.
Victoria, single-family benchmark price:
- Month-to-month: 0.5% to at $1,151,200, where it had first been in December 2021
- From peak in April 2022: -10.9%
- Year-over-year: +1.7%.
Ottawa, single family benchmark price:
- Month-to-month: +1.0% to $729,300, where it had first been in April 2021
- From peak in March 2022: -11.1%
- Year-over-year: +3.7%.
Ottawa, condo benchmark price:
- Month-to-month: -0.4% to $404,400, below April 2021
- From peak in March 2022: -11.5%
- Year-over-year: -2.5%.
Calgary, single family benchmark price:
- Month-to-month: -0.2%, to $678,900, fifth month-to-month decline after a relentless two-year spike.
- Year-over-year: +7.3%.
Calgary, condo benchmark price:
- Month-to-month: -1.2%, to $338,100. Fourth month in a row of sharp declines after the gigantic spike.
- From peak in August 2024: -4.0%
- Year-over-year: +6.2%, the lowest year-over-year gain since January 2022.
Montreal, single family benchmark price:
- Month-to-month: -0.5%, to $637,400.
- From peak in May 2022: -1.1%
- Year-over-year: +7.5%.
Montreal, condo benchmark price:
- Month-to-month: +0.8%, to $413,600.
- New high
- Year-over-year: +5.9%.
Halifax-Dartmouth, single family benchmark price:
- Month-to-month: +1.2% to $533,500
- From peak in April 2022: -6.3%
- Year-over-year: +4.2%.
Edmonton, single-family benchmark price:
- Month-to-month: +0.7% to $461,900, roughly unchanged for the past seven months, and down a hair from the all-time high in August 2024.
- Year-over-year: +9.7%
- In the 17 years since the peak of the prior bubble in June 2007, the index is up 16%.
Edmonton, condo benchmark price:
- Month-to-month: +0.3% to $194,700, first seen in 2007.
- From peak in June 2007: -19%
- Year-over-year: +9.4%
Quebec City Area, single-family benchmark price:
- Month-to-month: -1.4% from the all-time high, to $428,400
- Year-over-year: +10.0%
Winnipeg, single-family benchmark price:
- Month-to-month: -0.4% to $378,800
- From peak in May 2022: -2.4%
- Year-over-year: +9.3%
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The post The Most Splendid Housing Bubbles in Canada, Dec. 2024 by Metro: Toronto, Vancouver, Victoria, Calgary, Ottawa, Montreal, Quebec City, Halifax, Edmonton, Winnipeg appeared first on Energy News Beat.
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