The Canadian housing market is beginning to look like a large jumbled puzzle. A week after a report showed the price of an average house had soared to a record high, an alternate report suggested Wednesday prices have in fact declined for five consecutive months.

Both sources are respectable, and their data accurate. But different methodology has led to a discrepancy between the figures. So where does the Canadian housing market stand?

Economists and those in the real estate industry believe conditions fall somewhere in the middle.

The price of a Canadian home was down 6.7% in April from a year earlier, the relatively new Teranet–National Bank House Price Index showed Wednesday. It was the fifth consecutive month of yearly decrease and caused the index to be down 8.9% from its peak in August. Home prices in Vancouver were down 10.9% from April last year, while prices dropped 9.8% in Calgary and 7.6% in Toronto. On a positive note, prices were up 2.4% in Montreal, 0.6% in Ottawa and 0.2% in Halifax.

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The new-condo market may be just starting to warm up again but the resale market is hot. Units in highly sought after areas are drawing multiple offers and selling quickly.

The new-condo market may be just starting to warm up again but the resale market is hot, according to May statistics from the Toronto Real Estate Board (TREB). In fact, condo resales, at 2,081 units in May, were up about 2 per cent from the same month a year earlier.

Condo resales are again moving in lockstep with single family homes and townhouses.

In May, total Multiple Listings Service (MLS) condo sales were 4,561 units in the Greater Toronto Area, compared with 4,422 in May last year – a 2 per cent increase.

The average selling price for all MLS sales (including both houses and condos) was $399,811, down a touch from $400,817 last year.

While condo resales were up, listings were down, says Jason Mercer, senior manager of market analysis at TREB. The upshot is that more buyers than sellers means resale condos are moving with great speed – often as little as a week on the market – and the best ones are drawing multiple offers.“Sellers here in Mississauga are getting between 85 per cent and 105 per cent of the listing price,” says Debbie Cosic of Sutton Group Signature Realty Inc. of Mississauga. “In highly sought after areas like Lorne Park just north of Lakeshore Road and Mineola, near Highway 10 and the Queen Elizabeth, you will see three or four offers and suites moving within a week, often at more than the asking price.

“Calls to our office are up 60 per cent from March and showings of properties are up about 60 per cent as well.”

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