Why are sales up so much (+362.1%) when comparing year-over-year, but down (-12.7%) when comparing month-over-month? Have average home prices levelled off?
Watch this month’s video to find out:
Or, read the video script below:
Hi, it’s Miia here with your monthly update. Today I’ll talk about why home sales in April were up by 362.1% compared to a year ago, but down by 12.7% compared to a month ago.
April 2021 vs April 2020
April was the first full month of the pandemic in the GTA in 2020, so when we compare April of this year to that of last year, we see rather unusual numbers.
The number of homes sold this year in April was up by 362.1% compared to April 2020. This unusual increase is explained by the initial reaction to the pandemic in 2020, in which many people temporarily froze their buying and selling activities as they adjusted to the new world.
Since then, the real estate market picked back up and is as busy as ever.
April 2021 vs April 2019
If we compare April of this year to April of 2019, two years ago (arguably, a closer to “normal” year), the April sales were actually up by 51.1%. From this perspective, we had a strong month of sales in April.
April 2021 vs March 2021
Perhaps even more interesting is that the number of sales in April of this year actually DROPPED by 12.7% when compared to the previous month, March 2021.
This is interesting because the usual seasonal trend is for sales to increase from March to April, as the Spring market gains momentum.
Explaining the Statistics
What the Toronto Regional Real Estate Board is suggesting, in part, is that the market has had a fixed pool of buyers, whereas we would usually have population growth, primarily from immigration, and therefore, a sustained demand for housing; but because of the pandemic, our population has not had its usual growth.
Furthermore, we have already been through a year of sales during this pandemic, and the initial impact of the pandemic on people’s changing housing needs may have now settled down.
Average Home Price
Looking at the overall average home price, this, too, has settled down. Whereas over the course of the last year, we saw rapidly rising prices, when we compare the last two months, the overall average home price was basically flat (decreasing by 0.6%).
That’s my update for this month. Catch more of my market updates by joining me on Facebook, Linkedin or Instagram.
If you have any questions, let me know.
Bye for now.
Miia
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