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Canada’s year-long housing slump, brought on by rising interest rates, appears to have come to an end, a new report has found.
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RBC Economics published its most recent market update pointing to “green shoots” of demand growth with March sales increasing 1.4 per cent from February.
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Equally important was that prices increased 0.2 per cent nationally, the first month-over-month increase in more than a year.
Still, sales and prices remain far below what they were a year ago, it noted.
Nationally, prices are still down nearly 16 per cent while sales are off more than 34 per cent.
Calgary remains one of the tighter markets in Canada despite sales falling in March from February by 2.3 per cent and were down 42 per cent year over year.
Average prices also dropped 0.2 per cent month over month in Calgary, but they had increased about one per cent from March last year, the report found.
The challenge in Calgary — as elsewhere in Canada — is low supply, which is holding back stronger sales and price growth, it further noted.
New listings in Calgary were down almost 13 per cent in March from February and about 40 per cent year over year.
Nationally, listings fell about six per cent month over month and about 27 per cent year over year.
The report also noted that Calgary was the largest major market with conditions favouring sellers with a sales-to-new-listing ratio of 85 per cent in March. In contrast, the national average was 63 per cent, slightly above the 60 per cent threshold between a balanced market and conditions favouring sellers.
