Housing Starts in Canada – All Areas. (CNW Group/Canada Mortgage and Housing Corporation)
Canada’s total monthly seasonally adjusted annual rate (SAAR) of housing starts had a massive jump in April, reports Canada Mortgage and Housing Corporation (CMHC) in its latest report. April saw starts rise 30 per cent to come in at 278,606 units, as compared to the 214,205 units reported for March.
This helped pace the six-month trend to an increase of 2.4 per cent for the month. The trend, which is a six-month moving average of the SAAR of total housing starts for all areas in Canada, rose to 240,905 units in April.
Actual housing starts were up as well, rising 17 per cent year-over-year in centres with a population of 10,000 or greater. CMHC reports that 21,720 units were started this past April, compared to 18,539 in April of 2024. This marks the highest actual housing starts for the month of April on record, and pushed the year-to-date total to 67,022, although the year-to-date is still down two per cent from the same period in 2024.
Among Canada’s big three cities, Montreal posted a 64 per cent year-over-year increase in actual housing starts compared to April of 2024, primarily driven by more multi-unit starts. Vancouver recorded a six per cent increase in starts this month, also driven by higher multi-unit starts. Conversely, a decrease in multi-unit starts drove a 25 per cent year-over-year decrease in Toronto’s housing starts, compared to last April.
“The increased starts activity in April was driven by increases across all housing types in Quebec and the Prairie provinces, while starts in Ontario and British Columbia declined on a year-over-year basis again this month,” explained Kevin Hughes, CMHC’s deputy chief economist. “The current economic uncertainty will have consequences for the supply and demand of new housing. CMHC will be monitoring these effects closely over the coming months.”