In the blog last month, it was a continuation of the narrative for several months whereby freeholds were going strong and condos were kind of hurting, especially in the downtown core. And then December happened. As always, you'll find the full set of market charts (only excerpts are highlighted below) here on my website. Let's get at December... About-face for condo sales For the first 6 months of the year, whether starting the year the year off hot in... [read more]

Carrying on the narrative from last month, and the last several really, condos are still having a rough go of things, and freeholds are not. You'll find the full set of market charts (only excerpts are highlighted below) here on my website. Let's get at November... Freeholds are all caught up - and then some After the big 416 freehold sales hole from April (-65% YoY) and May (-62%) and even June (-12%), I would never have thought we'd be able to... [read more]

I was in a recent Toronto Star article on buying pre-construction condos, and I've been sitting on this data for a long time and meaning to write a post about it. Here's that post, on condo fees being higher in reality than were  advertised to you when they sold you your unit. photo by JasonParis, Creative Commons license How prevalent is underestimation by developers? First a bit about what these numbers are based on. I was provided with a... [read more]

Carrying on the narrative from last month, condos are still having a rough go of things, and freeholds are not. You'll find the full set of market charts (only excerpts are highlighted below) here on my website. Let's get at October... Freeholds are all caught up It's pretty crazy to look back at that sales hole from April (-65% YoY) and May (-62%). Heck, even June was -12%. The sales transaction deficit bottomed out at the end of June, with sales 1,634... [read more]

The split in how freehold and condo markets are acting that I pointed out last month carried on into September. The normally sleepier months of July and August were making up for a lost spring, posting higher than normal sales due to "pent-up demand." Well September did the same with 416 sales transactions up 19% over the same month last year. If that sounds high, 905 sales were up 57% YoY, as lowrise housing is de riguer.  You'll find the full set of market... [read more]