Yahoo Finance Parts of Ontario's housing market are down 30%, two years after new rules to cool it down
More than two years have passed since Ontario introduced measures to cool down its housing market, and according to new data, it worked.
The Fair Housing Plan included a 15 per cent non-resident speculation tax and rent control, which has been dialed back by the current Conservative government. A new federal mortgage stress test most certainly played a role too, but Zoocasa says the changes really got into homeowners’ heads.
“The changes had an immediate psychological impact on the market. Local real estate boards noted a large influx of listings in the following months, as skittish sellers looked to cash in before the market went soft,” said Zoocasa’s managing editor Penelope Graham, in the report.
“As a result, a number of housing markets within the province experienced double-digit per cent price and sales declines, especially among higher-priced single-family home types.”
York region has been hit particularly hard. The average price of a home in Newmarket is down 30 per cent to $725,710. It was over a million dollars before the Fair Housing Plan. Aurora is also down 30 per cent, to $888,387. Richmond Hill will still cost you more than a million dollars on average, but prices have come down 27 per cent and Zoocasa now sees it as a buyers’ market.
Markham and Vaughan round out the bottom five with 24 per cent and 20 per cent declines respectively. The average price of a home has dipped below a million dollars in both markets.
On the other hand, prices have gone up in some parts of the province. The Windsor-Essex region is up 25 per cent. And yet, the average price is still a relatively affordable $343,956. London is up 19 per cent to $429,058. The Ottawa region is up 10 per cent to $450,295. Zoocasa labels all three as seller's markets.
Jessy Bains is a senior reporter at Yahoo Finance Canada. Follow him on Twitter @jessysbains
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