Real Estate prices up over 100% in the past decade in Quebec

[jesseps]

Quebec’s once lagging real estate prices more than doubled between 2000 and 2010, as the province’s residential market played catch-up with the one in Ontario, an analysis shows.

 

During the last decade, average home prices increased by 123 per cent, almost six times faster than the rate of inflation which grew by 20 per cent during the same period, the analysis by the Quebec Federation of Real Estate Boards says.

 

It’s the first decade where home prices in Quebec grew faster than the Canadian average, which was 107 per cent between 2000 and 2010.

 

But while real estate prices grew faster in Quebec than in Ontario over the decade, the rise in property values was far more dramatic in other Canadian provinces. Prices grew by 140 per cent in Alberta and by 160 per cent over the decade in Saskatchewan, with both provinces benefitteing from the boom in commodities.

 

“We didn’t have the same results as in Calgary, but Quebec still fared very well,” said analysis author Paul Cardinal. “We were able to catch up, to a certain extent, with (prices) in Ontario.”

 

Between 2000 and 2010, the median price of a single-family home grew from $94,500 to $209,500 in Quebec. The top performing market in la Belle Province was the Quebec City region, where the median price of a single-family home grew by 159 per cent to $220,000.

 

In the greater Montreal area, the median price of a single family home grew 133 per cent, from $108,000 in 2000 to $252,000 last year, the analysis said.

 

Despite the rise in prices, Quebec remains one of the most affordable housing markets in the country, Cardinal said. Because of the drop in interest rates, Montreal properties were actually more affordable in 2009 than they were in 1989, he noted.

 

Interest rates are expected to rise gradually this year, Cardinal and other analysts have predicted.

 

Yet one of the study's Cardinal cites, the RBC Housing Trends and Affordability report, notes that Montreal has become the second least affordable city in Canada to purchase a condo, after Vancouver. An explosion in new construction projects has driven down prices to the point where condo projects are actually slightly more affordable - albeit still more expensive - in Toronto than in Montreal, RBC author Robert Hogue told The Gazette in February.

 

Yet prices for other properties, including detached bungalows and standard two-storey homes remain more affordable in Montreal than in Toronto, the RBC report says.

 

The federation expects Quebec home prices to grow by a modest four per cent in 2011.

 

Read more: http://www.montrealgazette.com/business/Quebec+real+estate+prices+cent+from+2000+2010/4517279/story.html#ixzz1I5MEJCH1

 

Next stop, New York prices?

 

At the way the prices are going, I will for sure have a hard time buying a home. True, I could always look into condos, but paying maintenance fees each month

Modifié 30 mars 2011 par jesseps

[Rocco]

Tant que les taux d'intérêts resteront artificiellement bas comme c'est le cas actuellement, la balloune va continuer de gonfler. Le taux d'intérêt moyen pour les 50 dernières années sur une hypothèque à 5 ans est d'environ 7 à 8%. A 3.5% actuellement, c'est toute une génération de premiers acheteurs qui ne savent vraisemblablement pas dans quoi ils s'embarquent.