Detached Homes Stay Single & Condo Continues To Breed Like Rabbits
Winter’s chill can’t freeze condo boom
A new reading Monday on the strength of the condo market, particularly in Central and Eastern Canada, raised eyebrows among economists.
GTA home prices tell tale of 2 cities: condos vs. family homes
Different market segments moving in different directions
Real estate in the Greater Toronto Area is becoming increasingly divided between existing single family homes and a crush of new condo towers, one of Canada’s biggest banks says in a report issued Monday.
TD Bank economists Derek Burleton and Diana Petramala said people’s obsession with house prices in the Toronto area has obscured the differences between various subsections of the market: the 905 area versus the 416; detached houses versus condos; and new builds versus existing homes.
Real estate in the Greater Toronto Area is becoming increasingly divided between existing single family homes and a crush of new condo towers, one of Canada’s biggest banks says in a report issued Monday.
TD Bank economists Derek Burleton and Diana Petramala said people’s obsession with house prices in the Toronto area has obscured the differences between various subsections of the market: the 905 area versus the 416; detached houses versus condos; and new builds versus existing homes.
“One market is facing too much supply, while another appears to be heating up,” the bank said. “The GTA housing market is a tale of several markets with divergent conditions.”
Single-family homes
If there’s a public perception that Toronto’s real estate market is red-hot and has been for a while, there’s little doubt that’s being driven by what’s happening with single-family detached homes.
To put it simply, they’re hot.
Across the GTA as a whole, prices for single-family homes increased by 12 per cent in the year that ended in January. That’s much stronger than the gains seen in all other categories of real estate. But it may be a surprise to note that the volume of sales are well below historical norms.
The bank points out that there were 43,000 detached homes sold in the resale market across the GTA in 2013. On top of that there were 9,900 new builds. That compares with 22,000 new builds in 2002. Price increases in the category are in a large part being driven by lack of supply.
“Scarcity has been a major issue in this pocket of the marketplace,” the bank said.
New homes effectively aren’t being built in downtown Toronto, driving up the price for the ones that already exist. For every detached house that gets built, there are three new condos built, the bank says.
A city of condos
Despite the lack of new single-family homes, more than 70 per cent of new home sales in the GTA as a whole are happening in Toronto proper. The seeming discrepancy within that suggests that what is being built, more often than not, is a condo.
Indeed, so many new condos are being built that the sale prices are being cannibalized by those that came before. The average price of a new condo is $545,000, TD Bank said. But prices for existing condos are much lower — $347,000, on average. Older condos are also generally larger — the average unit size in 2005 was 925 square feet, but had shrunk to 798 square feet in January.
With 70,000 new units expected to come online this year and next (twice the historic average) that’s a gap the bank doesn’t expect to close any time soon.
And this big boys toy costs $2,450,000 …
AND IT WENT FOR – 13 Crown Park Road – BEACHES
And though I kind of prefer the old house (not crazy about the sloped roof or stone facade of the new place), they have done a good job with the inside.
The style isn’t for everyone but it a good family house.
It has been listed since at least the beginning of November when the asking price was $2,575,000.
I thought they would perhaps drop the price in the new year to $2,395,000. That never happened.
But the house did finally sell…for $2,450,000.
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