Robust immigration in PEI played a large part in this trend, CREA says
Over the last three years, residential property prices in Charlottetown grew far more rapidly compared to the nation’s hottest markets, data from the Canadian Real Estate Association indicated.
The PEI capital’s home price growth of 38.5% during that period considerably outstripped the rates seen in other high-volume cities like Victoria (33.3%), Toronto (25.3%), Montreal (17.7%), and Vancouver (10.93%).
The provincial nominee program was a major factor in the development: A steady influx of immigrants looking for homes of their own has stoked demand to unprecedented heights. From 2010 to 2018, over 12,000 immigrants have arrived at PEI.
“They came with a lot of money and they wanted something new, and we didn’t really have a lot of new stuff at that time,” PEI Real Estate Association Greg Lipton told CBC News.
“New construction is very expensive. We’re up to close to $200 per square foot nowadays to get anything built.”
During that same three-year time frame, Charlottetown’s average housing price increased from $200,000 to $277,000.
However, the market should take heed of its immigrant retention rate, which was found to be the worst in Canada.
This has a significant knock-on effect upon the market, Lipton warned. Any departing immigrant will be looking to get the most value out of their investments, leading to progressively higher prices for the city’s residential assets.
“There’s not enough housing here right now, affordable or any other kind of housing, so once again people will pay the price.”
