The Toronto Real Estate Board released its market outlook for 2019 this week and the forecast is all good news! It’s predicting the average sale price to be about 4% higher for 2019 and a moderate increase in total sales to come in around 83,000 ends, compared to 77,375 sale ends we had in 2018. It’s also encouraging to see a slight increase in the selling price for The City of Toronto in January, coming in at $777,674 up 1.4% compared to January 2018, and up 1.9% from December. Taking into account the entire GTA region the number of transactions edged upwards and inline with TREB’s forecast for higher sales in 2019.

The resale condominium market continues to lead the way in terms of price growth, up 8.8% on a year-over-year basis with the average sale price at $591,444 for the City of Toronto. The rental market in the GTA is expected to remain tight in 2019 with the supply of rental units still expected to be of concern.

The number of new freehold listings decreased last week but that could be because of the massive snowstorm Toronto had. 20% fewer listings week-over-week created increased competition with 45% of sales selling at or above the asking price. The busiest part of town is still the east end of the city where multiple offers are still the norm. More than 85% of the properties sold over asking.

The condo sector saw a small 6% uptick in new listings last week and no change in the number of sold condos from the previous week. TREB has based its predictions on a lpsos survey and 26% of those looking to buy this year are planning to buy a condo. The proportion of buyers who are planning to buy their first home are still finding it difficult to qualify for loans under the new mortgage stress test.