FRANKFURT/TORONTO, May 10 (Reuters) – Home sales in the Greater Toronto Area (GTA) rose 13.7 percent in April from a year earlier and prices jumped to an all-time high on supply shortages, while sales in the Vancouver area climbed 5.7 percent year-on-year, Canada’s two largest real estate markets said.
Toronto home sales in April rose to 20,406 from 17,562 a year earlier, the Toronto Real Estate Board (TREB) said in a report on Thursday. It was the second monthly record-setting performance in a row for the area, where double-digit sales growth has been largely masked by the dramatic declines since the summer of 2017.
Sales rose 18.5 percent from March as price growth slowed from late last year. The average selling price rose 10.9 percent to C$948,135 ($733,035) in April.
“The historic gains in Toronto home prices in recent years cannot continue, and there is the potential for a correction of up to 20 percent by this time next year,” TREB Chief Executive Tim Syrianos said in a statement.
The provincial government, which last year introduced a foreign buyers tax and mortgage stress test in the Toronto region, introduced additional measures in April 2018, as well. ($1 = 1.2936 Canadian dollars) (Reporting by John Revill and Matt Scuffham; Editing by Mark Potter)