Here’s What Halton’s Housing Market Looked Like in July

Published August 27, 2019 at 1:20 pm

July was a busy month for the Halton housing market – and the Canadian housing market in general.

July was a busy month for the Halton housing market – and the Canadian housing market in general. According to a recent Zoocasa blog post, for the most part, the number of home builds, sales, and prices all increased last month.

On the contrary, Zoocasa says that the number of newly-built homes dropped by 9.6 per cent in July. This drop was led mainly by a drop in construction of row houses and apartments. And the seasonally adjusted annual rate (SAAR) of housing starts also dropped to 222,013 units in July from 245,455 units in June. On the other hand, according to Zoocasa, multiple urban starts decreased by 12 per cent (to 162,722) and single-detached urban starts decreased by 4.6 per cent (to 46,400 units).

However, despite the decrease in the level of SAAR activity last month, Zoocasa says that the national trend in housing starts did increase from 205,765 units in June to 208,970 units in July 2019.

“High levels of activity in apartment and row starts in urban centres in recent months continued to be reflected in the high level of the total starts trend in July,” Bob Dugan, CMHC’s – Canada Mortgage and Housing Corporation – chief economist said in a statement.

And, as mentioned, national home prices also increased last month.

Looking at the Halton Region specifically, according to the Canadian Real Estate Association (CREA), along with the Niagara, Toronto, Moncton, and Victoria markets, the Oakville-Milton, and Hamilton-Burlington housing markets saw their benchmark price in July from the previous year.

 

On the other hand, some markets saw their benchmark price fall.

Despite many markets seeing price increases in July, Zoocasa says that home sale rose for the fifth consecutive month. National home sales rose by 3.5 per cent from June and by 12,6 per cent from July of last year. This, as noted by Gregory Klump, CREA’s chief economist, could be connected to the recovery from the stress test tightening last year.

“Sales are starting to rebound in places where they dropped when the mortgage stress test took effect at the beginning of 2018, but activity there remains well below levels recorded prior to its introduction,” Klump said in a statement. “By the same token, sales continue to rise in housing markets where the mortgage stress test had little impact due to upbeat local economic conditions and a supply of affordably priced homes. Meanwhile, the mortgage stress test is doing no favours for homebuyers and sellers alike in places facing challenging local economic prospects and subdued consumer sentiment.”

And home sales activity advanced in around 60 per cent of all local markets.

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Graphics are courtesy of Zoocasa.

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