OTTAWA – New home starts in Canada surged higher in February, continuing on the strong pace of January. Starts were up six per cent between the months of January and February, this after a 5.3 per cent increase between December and January. The increase represents the seventh straight month that the rate of new home construction has increased.
The Canada Mortgage and Housing Corporation reported new housing starts of 196,700 units on a seasonally adjusted annualized basis.
“The gain in February housing starts was concentrated in the multiple starts segment, particularly in Toronto,” said Bob Dugan, chief economist at the CMHC’s Market Analysis Centre.
Urban starts were up nine per cent for the month, to 179,100 units at seasonally adjusted annualized rates. Multi-family starts accounted for the majority of the increase, jumping 19.1 per cent to 89,900 units SAAR. Single-family urban starts were up by 0.5 per cent to 89,200 units SAAR.
Regionally, the SAAR of urban starts was up most in Ontario with the province seeing its starts increase by 28.6 per cent. Atlantic Canada was close behind with starts increasing by 14.3 per cent there, followed by the Prairie region which saw a 10.8 per cent increase, and British Columbia which was up eight per cent. Quebec was the only region to see a decrease as its starts dropped by 14.1 per cent.