
The Globe and Mail just published this article about Canada's real estate markets. It's behind a paywall, but if you're able to access it, you'll find 10 housing charts. The first is called "Winners and losers," and what it shows is the percentage change in CREA's home price index since February 2022 — which, in hindsight, was the top of the market. (I don't know what the end date is for this data, though.)
The first thing you'll see is that, very broadly, there's Southern Ontario and Greater Vancouver, and then the rest of Canada. Prices have fallen materially in Canada's most expensive markets, whereas in cities like Calgary, Saskatoon, and Moncton, nominal home prices are up by double-digit percentages. There isn't just one Canadian market.
The other thing I found interesting is the title "Winners and losers," because it reminded me of the great paradox of modern housing policy. And by this I mean: which cities are winning and which are losing? If you already own a home, then winning is positive price appreciation. But if you don't already own a home and you'd like to in the future, well then, falling home prices is winning — they've just become more affordable.
Not surprisingly, it's hard solving for two opposing kinds of winning.
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Brandon Donnelly
2 comments
Even prices going up is not always a win for homeowners. If you own a home but plan to live in it the rest of your life you neither win nor lose. If you own a home but your kids don't and you want them to live close you lose.
Inflation adjusted, city of Toronto HPI is up 40% from Feb 2015 to Feb 2020, and then from Feb 2020 to Feb 2025, down 4.7%. There are no winners. Making a house a speculative asset is unproductive.