Consumer Confidence Bolsters Housing Market but Recovery Uneven Across Canada

After a buoyant, if geographically uneven start to the year, Canada’s housing market is poised to moderate as 2010 unfolds, according to the Royal LePage House Price Survey.

The post-recession real estate recovery, which began in earnest in the third quarter of 2009, continued unabated in the first quarter of the year. While year-over-year unit sales volumes increased and prices appreciated across the country, a look back at the two-year period that spanned the recession’s beginning and end shows that some cities have experienced a rollercoaster effect of declining and rising prices, while at the other extreme, home prices in some regions never stopped appreciating.

“The first quarter of 2010 continued where 2009 left off, with more Canadians enthusiastically participating in a rejuvenated residential real estate market,” said Phil Soper, President and Chief Executive, Royal LePage Real Estate Services. “One of the earliest sectors of the economy to return to growth after the difficult recessionary period, the housing sector has been a prime beneficiary of low borrowing costs and improving consumer confidence.”

House prices were up across all key housing types surveyed by Royal LePage, with the average price of a detached bungalow in Canada rising almost 11% to $329,209 in the first quarter year-over-year, while standard two-storey homes rose 10.3% to $365,141 and standard condominiums increased 10.9% to $228,963.

Click here to read the full Royal LePage release.