Canada’s hot housing market ‘settling down’ amid rate hikes, new listings
A return to Bank of Canada interest rate hikes and growth in new listings started to cool off the housing market in June, according to the Canadian Real Estate Association.
Home sales were up 1.5 per cent in June from May, CREA said Friday, marking a smaller month-to-month jump from April.
Gains in Alberta and British Columbia were offset by declines in the Greater Toronto Area, the association said.
On a non-seasonally adjusted basis, the national average home sale price was $709,218 last month, up 6.7 per cent from June 2022.
Helping to cool down the housing market, according to CREA, was a jump in new properties hitting the market.
New listings were up 5.9 per cent month-over-month in June and are recovering closer to historic averages, the association said, compared to 20-year lows for the number of newly listed homes earlier this spring.
“With sales levelling off near historically average levels and new listings finally starting to play catch up, housing markets appear to be settling down,” said CREA senior economist Shaun Cathcart in a statement.
A pair of interest rate hikes from the Bank of Canada in June and July are expected to continue cooling the housing market heading into the summer, Cathcart added. CREA expects home prices to continue to rise but at a more modest rate compared to the busy spring months.
Brokerage Royal LePage also said in a revised outlook released Thursday that it expects moderate price growth through the end of the year.
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