Canada’s housing market appears to be cooling. Is this the right time to buy?

Home prices are falling in many parts of Canada, but there are important factors to consider before making an investment, according to experts. Knowing what the mortgage rate is and how much a family spends every month amid rising costs of living are some of the factors that need to be taken into account before purchasing real estate, they say.

The latest data from the Canadian Real Estate Association (CREA) showed prices hit $629,971 in July, down five per cent from $662,924 last July. On a seasonally-adjusted basis, it amounted to $650,760, a three per cent drop from June. When pandemic lockdowns began in March 2020, the average national price was $543,920.

The association forecast the national average home price will rise by 10.8 per cent on an annual basis to $762,386 by the end of 2022 and hit $786,252 in 2023.

So, is this the right time to invest in a property?

Even though such data can be helpful, a professor of Data Science and Real Estate Management at Toronto Metropolitan University, Murtaza Haider, says no one can predict if it’s too early or late, so Canadians need to take a more practical approach instead of a predictive one when it comes to purchasing a home.

“Affordability is not just the price of a property but what comes out of your pocket every month, then you realize that a lower price and higher mortgage could even mean more money going out of your pocket every month to support that mortgage,” said Haider, who also serves as the research director of the Urban Analytics Institute.

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