Canadian property market exceeding expectations

Property prices in Canada increased in May as the number of house sales continues to outstrip initial forecasts.

Flag of British Columbia

Flag of British Columbia

According to the latest figures released by the Canadian Real Estate Association (CREA), house prices across Canada rose by 3.7 per cent year-on-year, while residential property sales increased by 3.6 per cent.

The average price of a Canadian home sold in May was CDN$388,910. The province with the highest average property price is British Columbia (CDN$517,857) followed by Ontario (CDN$398,690). The cheapest property prices are found in the Maritime provinces of Prince Edward Island (CDN$169,810) and New Brunswick (CDN$160,914).

Calgary in Alberta has the fastest rising prices in Canada, with average residential property values in the booming oil-rich city growing by 6.87 per cent from a year ago. High levels of immigration in and around the Calgary area has been given as one of the main reasons behind the city’s rapidly rising house prices.

Meanwhile, the CREA reported there were 51,764 residential properties of all types sold across Canada, compared to 37,792 sales a month earlier. While on an annual basis the number of houses sold in May was down by 2.3 per cent on the same time last year, it was slightly ahead of sales projections given at the beginning of this year.

As a result of this latest data, the CREA has raised its forecast for home sales this year,  it now expects 443,400 homes to sell over the Multiple Listing Service in 2013 – 2.9 per cent more than originally predicted.

The pop in Canada’s resale housing numbers adds one more to a series of upbeat economic indicators that exceeded expectations in recent weeks,” said Canadian Real Estate Association chief economist Gregory Klump in a press release. “It’s important not to put too much stock in one month’s worth of data, but taken together with other recently published economic gauges, Canadian resale housing market results provide further evidence of the widely anticipated firming trend for [the] Canadian economy.”