Condo Market Report - November/December 2019

October sale numbers from TREB provides two continuing trends. With 8491 sales (up 14% from October of 2018), this is the best October (with the exception of 2016) for the last six years. Yes, the resale market is back to normal levels. But, the second trend shows that listings both ‘new’ and ‘active’ are down 10% and 19% from a year ago. That can only mean higher real estate prices going forward. For both buyers and sellers, the question becomes: how much? Without any Government intervention in the market, our guess is 6% on average. However, this will vary by region and by property type.

Looking more specifically at the condo market, October sales were only 4% higher than a year ago. But, when you look at condo sales over one million dollars, the October increase over October of last year was 32%! And 86% of these sales were in the City of Toronto proper. This increase can be traced to ‘baby boomers’ downsizing and wanting larger condos, and to non-resident investors who find the Toronto real market an attractive place for a second home. Political issues in the U.K., Europe, and the U.S. have made Canada and in particular Toronto a top destination. The good news is that the non-resident Foreign Buyer’s tax of 15% of the purchase price has resulted in average prices in this segment increasing by just 1% over October of last year – well below other markets.

Turning to the Downtown condo market, October sales were 6% higher than a year ago. In Humber Bay Shores, sales were unchanged from October a year ago. On the listing side, both ‘new’ listing for the month and ‘active’ listings at month’s end were unchanged from a year ago. The takeaway is that ‘active’ listings are lower than ‘new’, meaning that the inventory of condos for sales continues to decrease which suggests that prices will be higher, not lower, in the short term.