The region also saw its largest volume of listings year-to-date
The Montreal housing market is showing signs of continuous slowdown, building on trends seen during the past few months, according to the Quebec Professional Association of Real Estate Brokers.
The market saw a total of 2,681 home sales in August, representing a sharp 20% annual decrease. The market also continues to slow down, and more consistently than in the previous months of 2022 (except for January), QPAREB said in its latest report.
“For several months now, the markets in the major sectors of the Montreal CMA have been moving at different rates, even though all sectors have seen their number of residential transactions drop for the month of August 2022,” QPAREB added.
The North Shore experienced the smallest deceleration (down by 3%), followed by the South Shore (down by 10%). Double-digit decreases were the norm in August, with the sharpest drops seen in Saint-Jean-sur-Richelieu (down by 34%), the Island of Montreal (down by 31%), Laval (down by 28%), and Vaudreuil-Soulanges (down by 23%).
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Montreal saw its largest volume of listings year-to-date in August, with a 37% increase in active listings compared to the same period last year.
“August is usually characterized by a lower volume of properties coming on the market than most other months of the year,” said Charles Brant, director of the QPAREB’s market analysis department. “This is a situation that clearly characterizes and confirms a drastic change in the market’s direction.
“The magnitude of the increase in mortgage interest rates is beginning to be reflected in a more incisive way, with transactional activity slowing down further and the inventory of properties put up for sale building up. The market’s rebalancing process is therefore underway, albeit in a much more gradual manner than in the other Canadian metropolises.”
Median prices stood at $525,000 for single-family homes, at $385,000 for condo units, and at $697,000 for plexes.
