Canadian Home Sales Decline for Fourth Consecutive Month in July, Falling -15.2% Year-Over-Year

The Canadian Real Estate Association (CREA) reported on Monday (8-16-21) that national home sales in Canada were down -3.5% on a month-over-month basis in July 2021. This marks the smallest of four consecutive declines since March. Year-over-year (not seasonally adjusted) sales activity declined -15.2%.

While sales are now down a cumulative -28% from the March peak, Canadian housing markets are still historically quite active. The MLS® Home Price Index (MLS® HPI) increased 0.6% month-over-month and was 22.2% higher year-over-year. The number of newly listed properties dropped -8.8% from June to July.

In a statement prepared for the release of the CREA National Homes Report, Shaun Cathcart, CREA’s Senior Economist said, “The slowdown we’ve seen in home sales over the last few months has not been surprising, given that the level of activity we were seeing back in March was unsustainable. But we are not returning to normal, we are only returning to where we were before COVID, which was a far cry from normal. The problem of high housing demand amid low supply has not gone anywhere — it’s arguably worse. And after years of everyone agreeing that medium-density housing was the future, we are still referring to it as the ‘missing’ middle.”

There were 2.3 months of inventory on a national basis at the end of July 2021, unchanged from June.