While the economy and the real estate market remains in flux, it is important to keep track of how many homes are selling in your neighbourhood, and what they are selling for. In our opinion, one of the best neighbourhoods in the city is Topham Park, where there are about 1,100 homes in the area bounded by O’Connor Drive, Holland Avenue, Victoria Park Avenue and St. Clair Avenue West.
In a presentation in November 2023, Benjamin Tal, Deputy Chief Economist of CIBC World Markets Inc. had some interesting observations about inflation, mortgages and the housing market in Canada.
Mr. Tal believes the Bank of Canada’s prime lending rate of 2% should be higher than 3%. The current prime rate of 5% is 50 basis points over what it should be. He thinks the Bank of Canada will start lowering rates in May or June. In reality, we are in a recession if the effects of the 1 million immigrants annually is removed from economic calculations. Some positive news, Canada has the best record of all G7 countries in easing inflation.
The amount of mortgage interest payments are up, while the amount of mortgage principal payments are down. Interestingly, if mortgage interest was excluded from inflation rate calculations, we would be at the Bank of Canada’s target inflation rate of 2%.
We currently have a buyer’s market with few buyers and an increasing supply of properties listing for sale. The housing market will continue to decline for the next 6 months, during which the condo market will be more vulnerable than other types of housing. We will return to a seller’s market in 2025.