Last week both Buyers and Sellers were riveted to CP24 as news of our Mayor’s behavior continued to unravel. As a result, Toronto’s real estate market produced one of the most boring weeks of the year. This week we are in much better spirits. Life is returning to normal (sort of) and we are much happier watching Jon Stewart and Saturday Night Live Mayoral spoofs instead.

Now, back to business. If you’ve lived in the city more than a couple of years then you’ve already recognized the pattern. Listings go up in the spring and down by the end of the fall. Sure there are a few blips, due to heat waves, long weekends, and mortgage rate drops but the pattern seems to be fairly consistent. So it should come as no surprise that listings are down…..AGAIN. In the freehold sector available listings are down 5% this week and while sales are also down by the same amount, we are also happy to report that sales at or over the asking price has increased by 6%. While still not at the high of the year, Toronto remains the envy of the World’s Seller’s market with a remarkable 46% of sales happening at or above the asking price. This is not a function of low pricing rather, the strong demand!

After a short lived increase in listings last week, the condominium sector reported a 5% drop this week but unlike its freehold cousin, sales increased by a whopping 15%. Wow. For us though, our key metric for condo market health remains the percentage of suites selling at or above the list price. Again, while not at the high water mark set earlier in the fall, we are still seeing nearly a quarter of all condos sold in a bidding war this week and over 70% of listings surveyed selling at between 98% and 99% of the asking price.