Montreal home prices, sales increase

October 1, 2017

Montreal detached house prices were up 3.9 per cent in August compared to a year earlier, and virtually unchanged from a month earlier, according to the Teranet-National Bank National House Price Index.
The modest 0.09 per cent price drop from July is not indicative of a trend, said Marc Pinsonneault, a senior economist at the National Bank of Canada. “The four per cent that you see on a year-over-year basis, to me, is more revealing of the underlying trend,” he said.
Overall August home sales were up 8 per cent from August 2016 according to the Greater Montreal Real Estate Board.
Sales have been up on a year-over-year basis for 29 of the past 30 months, while the number of new listings has fallen steadily since late 2015.
“The market is a seller’s market, even for condos,” Pinsonneault said. “There’s been a remarkable improvement in the home resale market throughout 2016 and the first half of 2017. The market looks very good”.
The Teranet-National Bank index, which uses June 2005 as a base, was 159.25 in August, which means prices have risen 59.25 per cent since June 2005. Since the beginning of 2017, prices have risen 5.47 per cent.
The overall resale benchmark home price in Greater Montreal in August was $326,400, according to the Canadian Real Estate Association.