Toronto-area home sales down 16% in June despite Bank of Canada’s rate cut: board

The Toronto Regional Real Estate Board says home sales in June declined 16.4 per cent from last year, with many potential buyers staying on the sidelines despite the highly anticipated Bank of Canada interest rate cut.

The board said 6,213 homes changed hands in the month compared with 7,429 in June of last year.

The average selling price in the Greater Toronto Area was down 1.6 per cent year-over-year to $1,162,167.

New listings rose 12.3 per cent over the same period, with 17,964 properties put on the market last month.

TRREB president Jennifer Pearce said the central bank’s 25-basis-point cut last month provided some “initial relief” for the housing market, but the June sales data “suggests that most homebuyers will require multiple rate cuts before they move off the sidelines.”

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Ipsos polling for TRREB indicates that cumulative rate cuts of at least 100 basis points are required to boost home sales by a meaningful amount.

“The GTA housing market is currently well-supplied. Recent homebuyers have benefited from substantial choice and therefore negotiating power on price,” said TRREB chief market analyst Jason Mercer in a news release.

“Moving forward, as sales pick up alongside lower borrowing costs, elevated inventory levels will help mitigate against a quick run-up in selling prices.”

There were 23,613 active listings on the market last month, up 67.4 per cent from June 2023.

The City of Toronto saw 2,236 sales in June, a 20.6 per cent decrease from a year ago. Throughout the rest of the GTA, home sales fell 13.8 per cent to 3,977.

All property types saw fewer sales in June compared with a year ago throughout the entire region, led by a 28.1 per cent decline in condo sales.

Sales of townhouses and semi-detached homes fell 14.1 and 11.4 per cent, respectively, along with 10.6 per cent fewer detached properties that changed hands year-over-year.