Home prices in Canada held steady for the month of June, while national home sales rose 2.8 per cent, building on a 3.5 per cent rise in May, the Canadian Real Estate Association (CREA) said in newly released data on Tuesday.
However, experts say the long-anticipated recovery of Canada’s real estate market may be marred by U.S. President Donald Trump’s threat of new tariffs.
The signs of recovery in the housing market may only be “psychological,” Clay Jarvis, mortgage expert at NerdWallet Canada, said.
“Since home prices, the cost of living and mortgage rates all remain elevated, the change we’ve seen in the market has to be psychological. Canadians are exhausted with tariffs, with Trump and with the turmoil they’ve been subjected to since January,” he said.
“The risks involved with buying a home in the current climate are still there, but buyers seem more willing to move forward rather than spend their days looking over their shoulder,” Jarvis added.
While home sales in the Greater Toronto Area rebounded 17.3 per cent since April, nationally the picture is virtually a “carbon copy” of the sales figures from May, CREA’s senior economist Shaun Cathcart said.
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“It’s another month of data suggesting the anticipated rebound in Canadian housing markets may have only been delayed by a few months, following a chaotic start to the year,” Cathcart said.
CREA expects the delayed housing activity to start back up later in the summer or even in the fall as homebuyers who have been waiting on the sidelines look to jump back in.
“If the spring market was mostly held back by economic uncertainty, barring any further big shocks, that delayed activity could very likely surface this summer and into the fall,” CREA chair Valérie Paquin said.
In a letter to Prime Minister Mark Carney posted to Truth Social on Friday, Trump threatened a 35 per cent tariff on “Canadian products sent into the United States, separate from all Sectoral Tariffs.”
The new tariff would take effect on Aug. 1.
Jarvis said the newest threat could further spook homebuyers.
“The cloud hanging over the economy has gotten a little darker. Sales could maintain their momentum through July, but if there’s no progress on a trade deal with the U.S. in the coming weeks, the heightened uncertainty might have home buyers second-guessing themselves in August,” he said.
The price of the average home in Canada was $691,643 in June. While this was down 1.3 per cent compared to June last year, it was up compared to May of this year.
There were 4.7 months of housing stock on the market, which means that all conditions remaining equal, it would take that long for all homes on the market to sell.
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