Housing Market Statistics | April 2021
Record home sales in March 2021, new supply increases
National Home Sales

Home sales recorded over Canadian MLS® Systems climbed 5.2% between February and March 2021 to set another new all-time record. In the face of continuing strong demand, the increase in sales was likely the result of an increase in new supply.

Actual Activity

Actual (not seasonally adjusted) sales activity posted a 76.2% y-o-y gain in March, though year-over-year comparisons will be extremely stretched this spring because of last year’s initial lockdown period.

“ Seeing how many homes were bought and sold in March 2021, one could be forgiven for thinking the market just continues to strengthen, and maybe to some extent it is. The real issue is not strength in housing markets but imbalance.That demand has been around for months, but with the shortages in supply we have across so much of Canada, a lot of that demand has been pressuring prices. "
~ Cliff Stevenson, Chair of CREA
Newly Listed Homes

The number of newly listed homes climbed a further 7.5% to set a new record in March. Together with February’s big rebound, new supply is up more than 25% in the last two months.

MLS® Price Index

The Aggregate Composite MLS® Home Price Index (MLS® HPI) climbed by 3.1% m-o-m in March 2021 – similar to but slightly less than the record gain in February.

National Average Sale Price

The actual (not seasonally adjusted) national average home price was a record $716,828 in March 2021, up 31.6% from the same month last year.

“ We spent a lot of time over the last year talking about pent-up demand, but I think now is a good time to talk about pent-up supply, which may be the answer to the question everyone is asking right now. 2020 was the year that home became everything, so in hindsight it’s not that surprising that so many people who did not have one in which to ride out the pandemic really wanted one, while so many of those who did have a home to hunker down in were not inclined to give it up. ”
~ 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 more than $160,000 from the national average price.