Wednesday, September 30, 2009

Teranet House Price Index for July 2009

SEPTEMBER 2009

Monthly price rises in all markets surveyed

Canadian home prices in July were down 5.1% from a year earlier, according to the Teranet-National Bank National Composite House Price Index™. Though it was the eighth consecutive 12-month decline, it was also the first time in 13 months that prices in every region covered by the index were up from the month before. For the composite index it was a third consecutive monthly rise. The trend reversal is consistent with improving market conditions for the country as a whole in recent months - more homes have been selling and fewer have been coming on the market.

Teranet – National Bank National Composite House Price Index™

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The July monthly rises were 2.6% in Ottawa, 2.2% in Toronto, 1.5% in Vancouver, 0.8% in Halifax, 0.7% in Montreal and 1.0% in Calgary. For Calgary it was a first monthly rise after 12 consecutive months of decline. In three of the six markets surveyed, July prices were also above the pre-recession peak, as Halifax and Ottawa joined Montreal on this score. In the other markets, prices were still below those of a year earlier. The decline was 4.6% in Toronto, 9.3% in Vancouver and 11.1% in Calgary.

Teranet – National Bank House Price Index™

The historical data of the Teranet – National Bank House Price Index™ is available at www.housepriceindex.ca.

Metropolitan areaIndex level
July 2009
% change m/m% change y/yFrom peakPeak Date
Calgary149.751.0 %-11.1 %-14.6%August 2007
Halifax122.160.8 %0.5 %0.0%July 2009
Montreal124.850.7 %2.7 %0.0%July 2009
Ottawa118.642.6 %2.6 %0.0%July 2009
Toronto110.882.2 %-4.6 %-5.5%August 2008
Vancouver136.671.5 %-9.3 %-9.3%June 2008
National Composite123.871.6 %-5.1 %-5.3%August 2008

The Teranet–National Bank House Price Index™ is estimated by tracking observed or registered home prices over time using data collected from public land registries. All dwellings that have been sold at least twice are considered in the calculation of the index. This is known as the repeat sales method; a complete description of the method is given at www.housepriceindex.ca

The Teranet–National Bank House Price Index™ is an independently developed representation of average home price changes in six metropolitan areas: Ottawa, Toronto, Calgary, Vancouver, Montreal and Halifax. The national composite index is the weighted average of the six metropolitan areas. The weights are based on aggregate value of dwellings as retrieved from the 2006 Statistics Canada Census. According to that census1, the aggregate value of occupied dwellings in the metropolitan areas covered by the indices was $1.168 trillion, or 53% of the Canadian aggregate value of $2.207 trillion.

All indices have a base value of 100 in June 2005. For example, an index value of 130 means that home prices have increased 30% since June 2005.

By:

Marc Pinsonneault
Senior Economist
Econony & Strategy Group
National Bank Financial Group

Teranet - National Bank House Price Index™ thanks the author for their special collaboration on this report.

1 Value of Dwelling for the Owner-occupied Non-farm, Non-reserve Private Dwellings of Canada.

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The Teranet - National Bank House Price Index™ is an independently developed representation of the rate of change of Canadian single-family home prices. The measurements are based on the property records of public land registries. The monthly indices cover six Canadian metropolitan areas: Calgary, Halifax, Montreal, Ottawa, Toronto and Vancouver. The metropolitan areas are combined to form a Canadian composite index.

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6 comments:

Arwen said...

This really goes to show it's NOT different here; there's a "low interest rate", "puffed up on confidence in Canadian banks", upturn but it's nationwide.

Traciatim said...

Now I guess the question becomes, is this the calm before the real storm or has the worst past us and sunny skies will return soon?

I guess we will find out in the next few years.

Unknown said...

It would seem all of Canada is doing pretty much the same thing Vancouver is doing; a dip followed by a surge powered by ultra low interest rates. The real question is what will happen when interest rates pop up a point or two. Now that home prices are rising again people might continue to buy them on a speculative basis again, as they did before the bust. Then again the market peaked before the great panic of September, so maybe this really is the ceiling that Vancouver can afford.

Oh and if chad is still poking around here, I found some good hard stats that make vancouver seem insane.

http://www.demographia.com/dhi-ix2005q3.pdf

You probably dont have to read the whole thing (I didnt) but the basics are that any city with price to income ratios higher than 3 are considered unaffordable. Any city with price to income ratio of 5 or more are severly unaffordable. Vancouver shatters that scale with an insane price to income ratio of 8.4. That is the 4th highest in all of the areas surveyed. The 3 above us are all beach destinations where rich prople probably own huge homes and most jobs are cleaning those homes.

We even beat New York and London by more than 1.

The fact that we are almost 3X above what they consider affordable makes me wonder how anyone can think these prices are justified.

Anonymous said...

David,

I've read that in the past, the price/income ratios, price/rent ratios and inflation adjusted prices are the stats that obviously are things I look at that fight my bullish argument, if it weren't for these stats I would be WILDLY bullish but because of them I am cautiously bullish still maintaining flattish to somewhat higher prices 5-10 years down the road.

Dyugle said...

Nice to see the teranet numbers are once again taking the so called benchmark numbers to task. I can wait for the olympics, the HST and under consturction to fall below 10,000. 2010 should be an interesting year.

JimTan said...

Egads! Mortgage rates are falling again!