Housing Market Statistics | January 2021
Record December caps record year for Canadian home sales
National Home Sales

Home sales recorded over Canadian MLS® Systems jumped by 7.2% between November and December to set another new all-time record.

Actual Activity

Actual (not seasonally adjusted) sales activity posted a 47.2% y-o-y gain in December – the largest year-over-year increase in monthly sales in 11 years. It was a new record for the month of December by a margin of more than 12,000 transactions.

“ It’s official, despite all the challenges, 2020 was a record year for Canadian resale housing activity. While momentum continues into 2021, surging COVID cases and a return to April-like lockdowns in some provinces means we’ll be revisiting some of those virtual technology solutions to process deals in the first few months of the year. "
~ Costa Poulopoulos, Chair of CREA
Newly Listed Homes

The number of newly listed homes climbed by 3.4% in December, led by more new listings in the GTA and B.C. Lower Mainland, the same parts of Canada that saw the biggest sales gains in December.

MLS® Price Index

The Aggregate Composite MLS® Home Price Index (MLS® HPI) rose by 1.5% m-o-m in December 2020. Of the 40 markets now tracked by the index, only one was down between November and December.

National Average Sale Price

The actual (not seasonally adjusted) national average home price was a record $607,280 in December 2020, up 17.1% from the same month last year.

“ The stat to watch in 2021 will be new listings, particularly in the spring – how many existing owners will put their homes up for sale? We already have record-setting sales, but we know demand is much stronger than those numbers suggest because we see can see it impacting prices. ”
~ Shaun Cathcart, CREA’s Senior Economist

The national average price is heavily influenced by sales in Greater Vancouver and the GTA, two of Canada’s most active and expensive housing markets. Excluding these two markets from calculations cuts almost $130,000 from the national average price.