The sky is not falling. The pigs are not yet flying. And we are pretty sure that the price of real estate in Toronto is going to keep climbing, though perhaps not as quickly as it was already this year. But really, maybe it will. After the announcement of the Government of Ontario’s ‘Fair Housing Plan’ our in-house experts pored over the information looking for whatever information might lead us to think the suggested changes would improve housing affordability in the GTA.
Last week the real estate industry took a slight pause while several major religions celebrated their holiest of days all in the same week. In real estate the coming of spring normally heralds the beginning of the annual game of trying to show houses while the city, in an apparently random manner, shuts down streets and neighbourhoods for prolonged construction projects – BEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEP – We interrupt this regularly scheduled Bosley Insight for breaking news from the Provincial Government. It seems that the powers that be at Queen’s Park will be making changes to ‘slow down’ the real estate market in the GTA. We wish we could tell you what this means but, like you, we will need a week or so to see how it all shakes out. Stay tuned next week when we can report back on how pending legislative changes will affect Toronto’s buyers and sellers.
The old adage says that if March comes in like a lion it leaves like a lamb. If we consider the real estate market in the same vein, since March started with a roar we should have had a nice quiet end to the month. Alas, the real estate market respects no old wives tales as it wends its way through the spring. The last week of March capped off a month that saw prices jump an average 33% over March 2016. Through the year, the talk has been the lack of listings, and we are happy to say that March seems to have bucked this trend. The number of new listings in March 2017 is virtually identical for both the freehold and condo market as the number of new listings in March of 2016. Of course we complained about not enough listings last year too so we expect to see high demand pushing prices in an upward direction for the foreseeable future.