The Canadian Real Estate Association (CREA) just confirmed that it’s even less attainable for Canadians to enter the housing market with its recent cost predictions.
According to CREA, the average cost for house in Canada is set to climb to $680K, up a bank account-denting 19.9% from last year.
An earlier forecast had predicted an average home price in Canada of nearly $678K for 2021.
The association cited a tight supply as responsible for the price hike. CREA forecasts that about 656,300 homes will change hands in Canada in 2021. This marks an increase from 2020 levels, but a nearly 4% decrease from the 682,900 it predicted earlier this year.
Sadly, there doesn’t seem to be any relief in the future in the cost department for Canada’s would-be first-time homebuyers. The number of transactions are forecast to fall by 12.2% to about 577,000 in 2022 and prices are expected to climb by another 5.6% annually to hit $718,00 next year. Gulp.
Of course, this figure seems low to anyone in the market for a home in the Greater Toronto Area (GTA), where the average selling price for all homes combined was up by 12.6% year-over-year to a sky-high $1,070,911 in August. Meanwhile, the sale price of a typical home in Calgary was a relatively modest $459,600 in the same month.
Across the country, prices have climbed in the past decade, especially since the onset of the pandemic. According to Statistics Canada, Canadian census metropolitan areas had average residential property values per private dwelling of $303,000 in 2011 -- a figure that sounds like a dream in our current climate.
Given the current crisis, housing remains a hot topic in the upcoming federal election, with affordable housing the prime concern of voters in the GTA. Here's to hoping for some change...
