As real estate prices in the Toronto region fall for the ninth straight month, suburban home prices in Peel, Durham, and Halton Regions are seeing a more than 25 per cent drop since the market peak in February 2022 — more than the Toronto-area average.
On Wednesday, the Toronto Regional Real Estate Board (TRREB) published a report on October home sales that put the average price of a Toronto-area home at $1.054 million, 21 per cent lower than the peak and seven per cent lower than last October, while sales are down 9.5 per cent year-over-year, to 6,138.
Since the 2022 peak, home prices are down 30.7 per cent in Durham Region (to $851,764), 26.7 per cent in Peel Region (to $965,359), 25.7 per cent in Halton (to $1.137 million) and 22.2 per cent in York Region (to $1.234 million).
According to Shawn Zigelstein, a broker at Royal LePage Your Community in Richmond Hill, suburban areas in Peel, York and Durham saw the biggest jumps when the market started to take off during the pandemic in 2021 and 2022, sometimes seeing double digit growth, month-over-month.
“The quickest up is always the quickest down,” says Zigelstein, “I don’t think it was sustainable.”
Zigelstein says that selling a property in Durham now takes four times longer, compared to October 2022, when the average length of time for a listing on the market was 16 days.
Sales in Durham are down 19.5 per cent since last October, and 36 per cent since February 2022.
Compared to October 2024, sales in York Region are down 9.8 per cent, while sales are down 5.6 per cent in Peel and less than one per cent in Halton.
Zigelstein has been tracking the number of homes sold for under $1 million, adding that lower priced homes are spending less time on the market.
Compared to October 2024, home prices in Peel Region are down 10.3 per cent while the price for a detached home fell 12.6 per cent.
Detached home prices in Peel and Durham regions have each dropped 31 per cent since the February 2022 peak to $1.2 million and $951,184, respectively.
“From someone who’s looking to get into the market right now, they’re benefitting from a more affordable situation,” says Jason Mercer, the TRREB’s chief information officer.
According to Mercer, home sales in places with labour sectors that could be affected by tariffs may remain on hold, while experts are still waiting to see if return-to-office orders will have an effect on the market, with more people choosing to live closer to work in downtown Toronto.
The TRREB report provided numbers for towns across the GTA.
Sales are down 11.3 per cent, compared to October 2024, while the average price has slightly increased from $1.22 million to $1.23 million.
New listings dropped 3.1 per cent from a year ago.
Detached home prices are down about 24 per cent since the peak in February 2022.
New listings for homes are up 3.2 per cent from October 2024.
Detached home prices in Vaughan have fallen 28 per cent since 2022, and 9.3 per cent compared to October 2024.
Oshawa has seen one of the steepest declines in home sales compared to October 2024, at a nearly 25 per cent drop.
New listings decreased 2.7 per cent, compared to October 2024.
Detached house prices dropped 10.5 per cent to $800,278.
Detached home prices are down 29 per cent from the peak in 2022.
New listings have increased 8.9 per cent, compared to October 2024.
