Royal LePage projects 12.4% price growth by year’s end
Ephraim Vecina
Canadian Real Estate Wealth
In its latest study, Canadian real estate franchiser Royal LePage predicted a staggering increase in Vancouver and Toronto home prices as well as sounded the alarm on the dangers of speculation in the two cities.
According to the recently released “Q2 2016 National House Price Survey and Market Survey Forecast” quoted by The Globe and Mail, prices in Greater Vancouver shot up by 24.6 per cent year-over-year in the second quarter of the year, with the median price settling on $1.1-million.
Meanwhile, the Greater Toronto Area saw a 10.2 per cent increase in the same period covered, up to $656,365.
Together, these numbers point at the long-term reliability of these markets, which might attract even more foreign buyers in the future and thus further inflame the already overheated housing segment.
Royal LePage pegged annual price increase in Q2 at 9.2 per cent, up to $520,223. It also forecast a 12.4 per cent year-over-year gain by the end of 2016.
“We don’t see even a mild correction for either the Toronto or pistol-hot Vancouver markets in 2016,” the report stated.
“Economic and social disruptions have rocked the world once again, introducing new risks and making it very likely that the Bank of Canada will leave interest rates as-is for now,” Royal LePage CEO Phil Soper said. “Few industries are as rate sensitive as real estate.”
Speculating is also a misguided path in the current climate, the executive said.
“A home is ill-suited as a buy-and-flip investment,” Soper noted. “People that engage in this kind of activity are inevitably burned when a market slows and the time it takes to sell the property increases substantially.”
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