As you can see from the mountains and the harbour, I’m not in Toronto right now.
But I still want to give you some updates on the Toronto real estate market because the April market watch report just came out.
At the end of the video, I’ll give you a suite tour at this most expensive hotel in Vancouver.
For three consecutive months, home prices have been trending up in Toronto.
It is interesting how all of a sudden, most people seem to agree that the market will be going up.
Everyone started talking about all the demand from immigration and how supply is not enough to satisfy the demand.
Essentially all the stuff I have been telling you throughout the market crash, I guess they are becoming obvious now.
So let me share the official numbers with you first, then I’m going to give you my take on where the market would go for the rest of the year.
#1 Average Prices
Let’s start with detached homes in the 416 area, City of Toronto.
In April, the average price was almost $1.79M, up 4.7% from just one month ago.
If you compare it to the peak in February 2022, prices are still down 13.8%.
What about detached homes in the 905, suburb areas?
The average price in April was around $1.4M, roughly the same as one month ago.
Still down 18.8% from the peak prices.
The city is recovering faster than the suburbs because prices were more ballooned during the pandemic when people thought they could just leave the city and work from home forever.
Now, let’s take a look at condos.
Condos in the city had an average price of almost $752,000 in April, up 2.6% from one month ago and down 10.8% from the peak in 2022.
Condos in the suburbs had an average price of almost $667,000 in April, up 3.4% from one month ago and down 11.8% from the peak.
#2 Sales Activities
In April, we saw 7,531 transactions.
How many transactions do you think we had during the peak last February?
9,097.
You see, we actually had a very active market in April, only 17.2% less active than the peak.
#3 New Listings
We had 11,364 new listings coming on the market for sale in April.
During the peak?
14,147.
So we had around 20% fewer listings to sell this year.
Here’s the thing.
We had fewer activities, but we also had fewer listings available for sale, both down almost 20% from the peak.
This means the market condition is pretty much as tight as the peak.
And when the market is tight, we see multiple offers and bidding wars pushing prices up.
I also want to give you some updates on the rental side of things, which is not in the official report.
On May 1, we moved in tenants to 19 of our rental management units, that’s our record number of lease closings in one single day.
We can see the rental market coming really strong.
Like I told you before, around 60 to 70% of our units are leased to work permit holders.
We can expect to see an even stronger rental market in the summer when all the international students are coming in for the September semester.
Whenever there’s a big change in the market, policy change or interest rates, it takes people roughly a year to accept and adapt to the change.
The interest rate hikes shocked the market around a year ago and the market reacted with a deep dive.
Now people have accepted the high interest rates and are starting to make adjustments to adapt to the change.
Maybe they would consider a smaller place now.
I think I have said it too many times already.
The Toronto real estate market is a market backed by real demands.
People need a place to live, doesn’t matter whether rent or own, they still demand a housing unit.
In terms of the forecast for the rest of 2023, the market will continue to recover but I don’t think we will hit the 2022 peak again just yet.
I think we will see that in 2024, it will be a much stronger market compared to this year.
Now, let me give you a suite tour.
This is a corner suite at the Fairmont Pacific Rim hotel, overlooking the mountains and the Coal Harbour, signatures of Vancouver.
I was actually expecting a more unobstructed view with a suite on a higher floor.
So I tried to change to another room with a better view, but they told me the entire hotel is fully booked.
Yup, $1,000 per night and it is still fully booked.
Sitting above this hotel is a private condo tower.
If you want a suite at this corner with unobstructed views, it starts from $3.8 million.
And it goes all the way to above $10 million.
Welcome to Vancouver, the most expensive city in Canada.
Next week, I’m going to share the story of a couple making a wrong decision downsizing from house to condo and the 3 lessons learned.
If you haven’t subscribed, make sure you do now so you won’t miss the story.
I’ll see you back in Toronto.