Housing supply crisis shows little sign of improving
Housing starts surprisingly fell by 3.3% last month in Canada compared with February as a sluggish pace of national homebuilding this year continued.
Data from national housing agency Canada Mortgage and Housing Corporation (CMHC) showed on Tuesday that the seasonally adjusted annualized rate (SAAR) of housing starts slid to 214,155 units last month, down from a revised 221,405 units in February.
That marked an unexpected dip, well below economists’ projections of 242,500 starts for the month, and the second monthly decline after starts also dived in February.
In centres with a population of 10,000 or greater, actual housing starts came in at 14,924 units compared with 17,052 the same time last year, while the monthly SAAR for those centres fell by 2.8% (from 209,093 units to 203,285).
The pace of housing starts in Montreal surged in March, jumping by 138% year over year thanks mainly to an increase in multi-unit starts. Still, that trend was offset by significant declines in Vancouver and Toronto, which saw starts fall by 59% and 65% respectively.
Multi-unit starts in Vancouver were well down, while multi-unit and single-detached starts fell in Toronto.
The pace of home construction shows little sign of rising to the levels needed to ease Canada’s housing crisis, with national supply levels still millions short of what CMHC says is required to make housing affordable for all Canadians by 2030.
Actual housing starts ticked slightly upwards in 2024 compared with the previous year, the housing agency said in January, increasing by 2% in centres with a population of 10,000 or more.
Overall unit starts came in at 227,697 for the year compared with 223,513 in 2023, with the total for all areas in Canada also increasing by 2% year over year to 245,120 units.
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