The average home price for the year is expected to reach $1,140,000, the Toronto Regional Real Estate Board (TRREB) said in its annual forecast, released Friday. That is higher than January’s average price of $1,038,668 but still 4 per cent lower than last year’s average.

The board forecast 70,000 sales this year, 7 per cent fewer than last year.“The second half of 2023 should be characterized by an increase in demand for ownership housing, supported by lower fixed mortgage rates, a relatively resilient labour market, and record immigration,” the board’s chief market analyst, Jason Mercer, said in a news release.

High rates have cooled the market for now, but what happens when a wave of eager buyers step off the sidelines and find a chronic shortage of housing?

 Real estate sales in Calgary saw record numbers in 2022

Calgary saw a record 29,672 sales in 2022, outperforming expectations in sales and growth in prices.

“Really different dynamics throughout the year, but whatever we had happen in the second half (of the year) didn’t offset the strong gains we had earlier in the year,” CREB chief economist Ann-Marie Lurie said.

The benchmark house price marketwide increased by 7.8 per cent year-over-year to $518,800.

“We’re in a really interesting, changing market right now. We had a little bit of a slowdown in the second half of the year,” Bev Clark of Knag Real Estate said. “Part of the reason was because we had lower inventory because there was a flurry of people wanting to sell their homes as they saw the market going up and everyone wanted to jump on the bandwagon.”

Supply of lower-priced homes remains low for January

The level of new listings in January fell to the lowest levels
seen since the late 90s. While new listings fell in nearly every price range, the pace of
decline was higher for lower-priced properties.
At the same time, sales activity did slow compared to the high levels reported last year but
remained consistent with long-term trends. However, there has been a shift in the
composition of sales as detached homes only comprised 47 per cent of all sales.

More stations, more service, more connections

GO Expansion program will see 80% of residents live within two kilometers of rapid transit. By building over 200 kilometers of new track and electrifying 600 kilometers of track across the region, the GO Expansion project will result in over 200 million boarding a year by 2040 across the GO rail network. We’re improving service now and into the future so transit will help York and Simcoe grow.

After a year of consistent interest rate hikes and stubbornly high inflation, housing construction slowed across Canada in December.According to recent data from Statistics Canada (StatCan), the total value of building permits issued in December fell to $10.3B, a monthly decline of 7.3% and down 9.3% from a year prior.
Looking at 2022 as a whole, the total current dollar value of building permits increased 6.8% annually; however, StatCan noted the increase was “largely the result of inflated valuations from persistent material and labour cost increase.” Adjusted on a constant dollar basis, the total value dropped 6.6%.