Key Insights from August’s Canadian Housing Data

1. Housing starts slipped again but the annual decline narrowed sharply: Actual housing starts in centres with populations of 10,000 or more totalled 17,691 units in August 2026, down 2.3% from the 18,112 units started in August 2025. That marks a fifth consecutive month of year-over-year decline, the longest such run since 2023, following declines of 2.5% in April, 7.2% in May, 13.0% in June and 18.6% in July. Cumulative starts for the first eight months of 2026 came to 149,542 units, about 3.9% below the 155,658 units recorded over the same period in 2025.

2. Regional trends pulled in different directions, with Ontario the main drag: On the six-month trend measure, Montreal and Vancouver each rose about 6%, with Montreal benefiting from gains across housing types and Vancouver from stronger multi-unit activity. Toronto was essentially flat, with both its single-detached and multi-unit trends holding steady. At the provincial level, modest gains in Quebec and Alberta were not enough to offset declines elsewhere, most notably in Ontario. The divergence is a reminder that a softer national headline can mask very different local housing dynamics.

3. Multi-unit construction led the weakness while single- and semi-detached starts rose: Apartment starts totalled 10,701 units in August, or 60.5% of all starts, down 6.3% from 11,416 a year earlier, while row starts fell 9.5%. Single-detached starts rose 7.4% to 4,064 units and semi-detached starts increased 26.1% to 1,035, lifting the single-detached share of starts to 23.0% from 20.9% last August. The August weakness was therefore concentrated in apartments and row housing, raising the question of whether detached formats are beginning to stabilize or whether the gains simply reflect normal month-to-month volatility in smaller categories.

4. Build times stayed well below last year even as they ticked up from July: The average time to complete a project across CMAs was 18.4 months in August, down 7.5% from 19.9 months a year earlier, though up from 17.8 months in July. The year-over-year improvement was driven in part by apartments, where average construction times eased to 21.9 months from 24.2 months. Across the past twelve months, only four months recorded overall construction times above their year-earlier levels, suggesting that the broader data continue to point toward shorter average construction durations despite occasional monthly increases.

5. The resale market stayed quiet for a fourth straight month: National home sales edged down 0.7% month-over-month in August and were 6.9% below their level a year earlier, extending a stretch in which both sales and prices have moved very little since spring. New listings rose 3.3% on the month after three consecutive declines, and with sales slightly lower, the national sales-to-new-listings ratio eased to 49.1% from 51.1% in July, below the long-term average of 54.7%. Months of inventory held at 4.8 for a fourth consecutive month, just under the five-month long-run average, leaving the market within historically balanced territory.

6. Home prices extended their run of stability while the annual decline continued to narrow: The National Composite MLS Home Price Index was flat from July to August, extending the calmest stretch of monthly pricing since 2024, and was down 3.0% year-over-year, the smallest annual decline since October 2025. The non-seasonally adjusted national average price was $668,219, up 0.6% from a year earlier. Prices remaining essentially unchanged month after month suggest that neither buyers nor sellers have established clear pricing momentum, even as the annual comparison gradually moves back toward flat.

We’ll continue to monitor the data and will share another update as soon as September numbers are released. Stay tuned.