Toronto and Vancouver Home Sales Continue to Climb in October, Detached-Property Outstripping Other Segments

A real estate sale sign is shown in a west-end Toronto neighbourhood on March 7, 2020. (Graeme Roy/The Canadian Press)

The latest home sales reports show housing demand continued to rise in October, mainly due to a surge in the detached property market.

A report (pdf) released by the Toronto Regional Real Estate Board (TRREB) said home sales have been on the rise in the Greater Toronto Area for the fourth consecutive month. On a year-over-year basis, 10,563 houses traded hands in October 2020, marking a 25.1 percent increase compared with the 8,445 transactions made in October 2019.

The rise in sales was not seen evenly in all housing types.

“Competition between buyers of single-family homes, and particularly detached houses, remained strong last month and continued to support double-digit annual rates of price growth in many GTA neighborhoods,” said Lisa Patel, the president of TRREB. "In contrast, condo buyers have benefitted from much more choice compared to last year."

Detached homes had an average sale price of $1,204,844 in October 2020, an 14.8 percent increase from last year. Condominiums averaged at $622,122, a mere 0.7 percent growth.

“Pre-COVID polling had already pointed to an increase in investor selling in 2020. The pandemic only added to this trend with a stall in economic growth and a halt to tourism impacting cashflows for many investors,” said Patel.

A surge in sales for detached homes was also observed in Vancouver, according to the Real Estate Board of Greater Vancouver.

“Sales of detached homes in October 2020 reached 1,335, a 42.3 percent increase from the 938 detached sales recorded in October 2019. The benchmark price for a detached home is $1,523,800. This represents an 8.5 percent increase from October 2019 and a 1.1 percent increase compared to September 2020,” said the REBGV news release.