Toronto Home Sales Reach Year High

Some of our neighbors north of the border are seeing a comeback in the home sales market.

In Toronto, home sales rose the most in nine months, climbing 13 percent from June to July, marking the biggest monthly gain since last October, Bloomberg reported. The data comes from the Toronto Regional Real Estate Board.

At the same time, the benchmark price of a home fell 0.2 percent from month to month, dropping to C$979,000 ($710,000 in U.S. dollars), marking one of the small declines in the past year.

The Canadian economy is seemingly outperforming expectations despite President Trump’s tariffs on Canadian exports, per recent Statistics Canada economic data cited by Bloomberg.

In June, the country’s unemployment rate fell, retail sales increased after a tumble in May, and preliminary data suggest the country will register overall growth in the second quarter. The unexpectedly high performance kept the Bank of Canada from cutting interest rates last month, though it could do so in the future.

Toronto homebuyers had the upper hand in July. Benchmark home prices were 5.4 percent lower than the same time last year, while new listings increased 5.7 percent, per Bloomberg.

“Improved affordability, brought about by lower home prices and borrowing costs, is starting to translate into increased home sales,” Elechia Barry-Sproule, president of the Toronto Regional Real Estate Board, said in a statement. “More relief is required, particularly where borrowing costs are concerned, but it’s clear that a growing number of households are finding affordable options for homeownership.”

Though Canada’s biggest city saw improved conditions month-over-month, home price growth is still lower compared to Montreal. The median home price in Greater Montreal rose 3.5 percent year-over-year to $620,100 in the second quarter, the Montreal Gazette reported, citing real estate company Royal LePage. Prices fell 0.8 percent from the first quarter, but Montreal still outperformed Toronto and Vancouver, where year-over-year values dropped 3 and 2.6 percent, respectively, over the same year-long period.

“The Quebec market is behaving very differently from British Columbia and Ontario,” Royal LePage’s Dominic St-Pierre said. “It’s asserting itself as a key player in the national real estate dynamic.”— Chris Malone Méndez