News   GLOBAL  |  Apr 02, 2020
 8.4K     0 
News   GLOBAL  |  Apr 01, 2020
 39K     0 
News   GLOBAL  |  Apr 01, 2020
 4.7K     0 

Thanks DearSummer, I couldn't have said it better myself. :)

Ex-Montreal Girl, you're the one who took a comment on rising property prices and stagnant incomes and launched into an attack on corporations and non-unionized labour. My intention was merely to point out the absurdity of your view that the two are related. If the middle class was truly under siege as you propose, we would not see home prices rising the way they are. The reality is that most people are doing just fine.
 
Thanks DearSummer, I couldn't have said it better myself. :)

Ex-Montreal Girl, you're the one who took a comment on rising property prices and stagnant incomes and launched into an attack on corporations and non-unionized labour. My intention was merely to point out the absurdity of your view that the two are related. If the middle class was truly under siege as you propose, we would not see home prices rising the way they are. The reality is that most people are doing just fine.

Sure! Everyone's great.

"Youth joblessness in Ontario was upwards of 17 per cent in Ontario last year and is estimated to be even higher now, according to Civic Action.

“we are looking at the potential of a lost generation,” said Civic Action CEO Sevaun Palvetzian. “This will cost us.”"
 
Most != Everyone. This is thread is about the housing market, which is booming because thanks to low interest rates, enough people can carry the large mortgages needed to sustain today's high prices. Obviously it is not good that so many people are being left behind in the shift to a globalized, knowledge-based economy but that doesn't seem to be affecting the housing market.
 
Most != Everyone. This is thread is about the housing market, which is booming because thanks to low interest rates, enough people can carry the large mortgages needed to sustain today's high prices. Obviously it is not good that so many people are being left behind in the shift to a globalized, knowledge-based economy but that doesn't seem to be affecting the housing market.

I get that. Enough people can carry the debt today.

I think the larger point is about tomorrow. Will the next generation of home/condo buyers be able to do so? Are there enough well paying jobs to support the housing market in the next decade?
 
"Youth joblessness in Ontario was upwards of 17 per cent in Ontario last year and is estimated to be even higher now, according to Civic Action.

“we are looking at the potential of a lost generation,†said Civic Action CEO Sevaun Palvetzian. “This will cost us.â€"
Not in my company. We're in construction products, and just today I asked the recently hired "just outs" if their former classmates are unemployed or underemployed, and to a man they said no, all their pals have jobs in their fields. Of course it helps that three of our recent hires have engineering degrees, and the other is commerce with a specialist in statistics. These guys have skills we need.

Get your degree in urban planning or the arts, and well you're going to struggle.
 
Not in my company. We're in construction products, and just today I asked the recently hired "just outs" if their former classmates are unemployed or underemployed, and to a man they said no, all their pals have jobs in their fields. Of course it helps that three of our recent hires have engineering degrees, and the other is commerce with a specialist in statistics. These guys have skills we need.

Get your degree in urban planning or the arts, and well you're going to struggle.

Thanks for the anecdotal information.
 
Cheaper 2 bed condos are selling like hotcakes. 1 beds are not selling as well. Too much product. This is just my interpretation of what I've been seeing.
 
Toronto is on track to see a record number of house sales this year as demand — and prices — continue to climb beyond almost anyone’s expectations, even for condos.


More than 8,000 homes sold across the GTA in September, bringing the number of transactions up almost 11 per cent for the first three quarters of 2014 compared to the same period last year, according to figures released by the Toronto Real Estate Board Friday.


Prices were up 8.5 per cent for the same period, year over year, with the average year-to-date price, for houses and condos combined, hitting $563,813, says TREB.


“If the current pace of sales growth remains in place, we could be flirting with a new record for residential sales reported by TREB members this year,” says TREB’s director of market analysis, Jason Mercer.


Sales have been especially strong in the sector that, just a year or so ago, was widely seen as being oversupplied and at risk of a price slump — condominiums.


The continued, unrelenting climb of Toronto prices — to the point where price growth here, as well as in Vancouver and Calgary, are skewing the national average — has renewed some calls for Ottawa to push up interest rates to slow down housing demand.


That could be an even more dangerous move, says Capital Economics economist David Madani in a note released Friday, given the high levels of household debt in the country.


House prices have already started to drop in Ottawa, Montreal and Halifax, he points out. And he anticipates that “demand fatigue” will spread over time to Canada’s major housing markets, as well.


Yet the Toronto housing numbers continue to defy the naysayers.


With the average sale price of detached homes in the City of Toronto now almost $1 million and intense competition for semis driving prices into the stratosphere, condos are now the go-to form of relatively affordable housing for folks just trying to get a toehold in a market that, so far at least, shows no signs of slowing.


Resale condo transactions were up 20.2 per cent in September over the same month of 2013, according to TREB’s figures. Most of the growth, some 32.2 per cent, was in the 905 regions compared to a 15.6 per cent increase in sales year-over-year in the 416 region.


Prices were up an average of 7.1 per cent — 9.2 per cent in the City of Toronto compared to 3.5 per cent in the 905 regions, says TREB.


That means the average sale price of a condo in the 416 is now skirting $400,000 — $395,505 — while it’s climbed just past $300,000 in the 905 regions.


The house sector continues to be plagued by a shortage of listings, especially in some high-demand areas of the City of Toronto, notes TREB.


That has helped push detached house prices up, yet again, by 11.5 per cent in the city and 8 per cent in the suburbs. That brought the average sale price for a detached to $951,792 in Toronto and $656,003 in the 905 regions in September.


Sales for detached homes were up 7.6 per cent across the GTA — 10.6 per cent in the city and 6.5 per cent in the suburbs.


Semi-detached house sales climbed 11.5 per cent in September, year over year, as prices hit an average $689,414 in the 416 region and $447,485 in the 905 regions.


Townhouse sales were up 7.2 per cent year over year with September sale prices averaging $476,408 in the 416 region and $409,327 in the 905 regions.
 
Toronto is on track to see a record number of house sales this year as demand — and prices — continue to climb beyond almost anyone’s expectations, even for condos

Thanks for this emotionally uplifting post for those who already own a piece of Canada -- especially in Downtown TO.
Keep these types of posts coming.

For those, who, for various reasons, do not yet own a piece of Downtown TO, well, that's another story.:)
 
Joe sounds like a frog in a boiling pot. Much like Bernanke did in 2005.

In all fairness to the finance minister, he does recognize that many will say that we're emulating the situation in the U.S. pre-recession. His rather simplified statement on this issue was that “our situation was totally different from the U.S. situation before the recession and it’s quite a bit different now. For one thing, their mortgages are non-recourse and ours are not, with the exception of Alberta. They also have mortgage deductibility. There are some differences.”
 
...
With the average sale price of detached homes in the City of Toronto now almost $1 million and intense competition for semis driving prices into the stratosphere, condos are now the go-to form of relatively affordable housing for folks just trying to get a toehold in a market that, so far at least, shows no signs of slowing.
...

As I've mentioned in the past, the average sale price of detached homes in the City of Toronto really isn't all that telling. Yes, it's been approaching $1M for a while now, and for the month of September, the average sale price was $951,792 but real estate is simply too regional to wrap your head around one single number to define such a large area of land. Here's what people need to know regarding the average sale price of the coveted detached home in Toronto:

Average sales price
Toronto West (W01 thru W10): $753,914
Toronto Central (C01 thru C15): $1,498,788
Toronto East (E01 thru E11): $648,951

If you take out central Toronto, the figures don't look quite as intimidating. The sales figures are a bit more realistic also if you look at median price instead of average price:

Median sales price
Toronto West: $628,888
Toronto Central: $1,227,500
Toronto East: $595,000

It is a well-known fact that central Toronto is home to some of the priciest neighborhoods in the country, and most certainly in the province. No surprise that sale prices here are twice that of Toronto west and Toronto east. As an overall average, combining west, central and east simply does not provide a clear enough picture of affordability in the city. All in all, while housing continues to ascend in Toronto and the sought-after areas are, as one would expect, appreciating very rapidly, I still believe there is affordable real estate in the city as a whole.
 
In all fairness to the finance minister, he does recognize that many will say that we're emulating the situation in the U.S. pre-recession. His rather simplified statement on this issue was that “our situation was totally different from the U.S. situation before the recession and it’s quite a bit different now. For one thing, their mortgages are non-recourse and ours are not, with the exception of Alberta. They also have mortgage deductibility. There are some differences.â€

If he really did say that, he's uninformed (which is never a good thing to learn about one's Finance Minister). Each US state is different - some allow non-recourse mortgages, but most do not. In fact, only eleven out of fifty states allow them - and one, Nevada, didn't start allowing them until almost two years after the house meltdown.
 

Back
Top