TRREB’s May GTA Data.

Despite all the clickbait headlines of sales surging over 360% year-over-year last April, we did experience a slowdown in the real estate market.

How?

Because when comparing the data to last year, we were comparing it to a completely dead month, were the market was slugging away due to the uncertainty brought about by the pandemic.

Lisa Patel, the Toronto Real Estate Board’s President, had attributed it to the fact that we may have reached the point where the domestic buyer activity has reached it’s peak. The market can expand without foreign investment and immigration short-term. However, in the long run, in order for it to continue expanding, it requires more people coming into the country.

May has propped up this hypothesis and despite outperforming the last year’s May, when compared to April and March – the sales are continuing to slide.

What was going on in the real estate market this May?

Cumulatively, sales in the GTA have continued to drop in May by 12.5% compared to April and 23.6% compared to March. Compared to May 2020 though, sales are up by a whopping 160%, but let’s not forget, things only started to pick up last May after a month of inactivity. It wasn’t until July when market heated up.

This doesn’t mean that the prices are going down though. In fact, compared to this year’s April there was 10.7% less inventory and 18.1% less compared to March. In other words, despite the drop in sales, the inventory also dropped which keeps the prices high and it’s still a sellers’ market.

Prices are climbing up, especially outside of Toronto

Cumulatively in the GTA, the prices rose 28.4% year over year, pricing an average detached Toronto home at over $1.7M. Since the prices are much more attractive outside of the city, the activity has moved there and prices rose 35% since last year, while the sales went up by 152%.

In Toronto, the sales outpaced the GTA’s, rising to 177% year over year. With that said, the market is currently neutral and is more stabilized than the one outside the city where it is deep into the seller’s market.

Last window of opportunity to buy a property in Toronto?

From the buyer’s perspective I would seriously consider the fact that with vaccinations are being aggressively rolled out, it is imminent that the borders will soon open up. With the renewed immigration and foreign investment, the market is expected to heat up and once it does it will happen very quickly. This could be the very last window of opportunity to purchase a property before the surge in the market.

Looking to make an investment or buy a home in Toronto? Let’s hop on a Zoom call and explore your options.