The Canadian Real Estate Association (CREA) forecasts that the national average home price will rise by 16.5% this year to just over $665,000.
The outlook came as CREA says home sales in February were up 6.6% compared with January and up 39.2% compared with a year earlier. The national average home price in February was a record $678,091, up 25% from a year earlier.
The association said it expects nearly 702,000 properties to trade hands this year, compared with 551,262 in 2020. Home sales are forecast to be around 614,000 units in 2022. The national average home price is forecast to rise by 16.5% on an annual basis to just over $665,000 in 2021 and reach $679,341 by the end of 2022.
CREA's forecast shows that COVID-19 has not deterred buyers, who have waded into expensive markets even as layoffs are plentiful and unemployment high. Throughout the second half of 2020 and the start of 2021, realtors reported bidding wars and high numbers of offers for suburban homes.
The largest year-over-year gains — above 35% — that CREA reported for February this year came from the Lakelands region of Ontario cottage country, Tillsonburg District and Woodstock-Ingersoll.
Price hikes in Hamilton, Guelph, Cambridge, Brantford, Kitchener-Waterloo and Peterborough hovered between 25% and 30%, but prices increased by 18.8% in Montreal and by between 10% and 15% on Vancouver Island, Winnipeg, the Greater Toronto Area and Quebec.
