The Canadian Real Estate Association (CREA) is forecasting that the average price of a home across the country will rise 4.9% to $710,468 this year.
The latest outlook from CREA is more than double the price increase the association had forecast as recently as January.
In its updated outlook, CREA said that it now expects 492,083 homes to trade hands this year, a 10.5% increase from 2023.
The upwardly revised forecast is mostly due to Canada’s strong population growth and expectations that interest rates will be lowered later this year.
High interest rates kept home buyers on the sidelines for much of 2023. CREA said it is now seeing signs of change in the housing market as people expect rates to fall in coming months.
CREA’s revised forecast comes as the number of home sales in March rose 1.7% from a year ago. The average price of a home sold last month was $698,530, up 2% from March 2023.
However, the number of newly listed homes declined 1.6% on a month-over-month basis in March.
There was 3.8 months of housing inventory on a national level at the end of March, unchanged from the end of February this year, but short of the long-term average of about five months of inventory, said the association.
