Single-family housing enjoyed particularly strong gains in sales numbers over the past year
Last year, GTA new home sales recovered from the 22-year low recorded in 2018, according to the Building Industry and Land Development Association.
Citing data from Altus Group, BILD stated that overall new home sales in the region in 2019 amounted to 36,471 transactions, outstripping the 24,855 deals completed in the year prior. This made 2018 the year with the lowest annual new home sales in the GTA since 1996.
Single-family housing – including detached, linked, and semi-detached houses and townhouses – represented 9,523 of the year’s new home sales. The figure represented a 157% year-over-year increase.
This acceleration was especially evident in Toronto’s single detached segment. Data from the Toronto Real Estate Board indicated that in December, the market saw 1,984 sales of detached homes, with a 24.77% annual gain The City of Toronto accounted for 465 transactions, which was 36.76% higher compared to last year.
During the same month, the number of new detached properties fell by 22.15% year-over-year, down to 1,627 listings. In the City of Toronto, 366 detached homes were newly listed in December, dropping by 2.91% annually.
As for condos, BILD reported that 26,948 condominium apartments were sold in the region last year, which was 27% higher than 2018 and 16% above the 10-year average.
The increasing popularity of this asset class could be attributed to recent policy shifts, BILD stated.
“In 2019, the Ontario government took important steps to address housing supply and affordability with the introduction of its Housing Supply Action Plan and related legislation,” BILD president and CEO David Wilkes said. “This year, all levels of government and our industry must continue to work together to transform our planning system so we can fix the housing supply problem in our region.”
