TORONTO - The Toronto Real Estate board has tallied 2,670 home resales in January, down 47 per cent from a year earlier, and reported Thursday that the average price declined eight per cent.
Meanwhile, the number of rentals through realtors has surged 30 per cent.
"Demand for existing homes in the Greater Toronto Area moderated as the housing market followed the broader economic slowdown in Canada," commented Jason Mercer, the real estate board's manager of market analysis.
The 2,670 sales through realtors in January compared with 5,075 a year earlier, and the average price declined to $343,632, compared with $374,449.
However, Mercer said mortgage rates remain relatively low and "given that we are not facing an early-1990s-style affordability crisis, the rebound in the housing market will likely be quick once economic recovery takes hold."
The real estate board also reported that 3,433 condominium apartments and townhouses were rented through realtors in the final three months of 2008, up from 2,635 in the fourth quarter of 2007.
"A good part of this increase likely came from rental listings in newly completed condominium apartment buildings containing investor-owned units," the board observed.
Average rents barely budged, with two-bedroom units up two per cent year-over-year to $1,895 a month, while bachelor-apartment rents slipped three per cent to $1,194.
"Investor-owned condominium apartments have become an increasingly important component of the GTA rental market," Mercer observed.
"Very few purpose-built rental apartments have been completed in the GTA over the past few years."
