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Canadian new home prices rise 0.3 percent
OTTAWA, (UPI) -- Canadian new home prices rose 0.3 percent, up a 10th straight month, the government's statistics agency said Thursday.
The April figures, matching March's gain, indicated prices rose in 11 of 21 metropolitan areas, fell in four and were unchanged in six, Statistics Canada said.
St. John's, Newfoundland and Labrador led the country with a 1.1 percent gain. Builders in all three cities said rising material and labor costs were key factors in the price increases, the Canadian Broadcasting Corp. reported.
Regina and Saskatoon, both in Saskatchewan, followed at 0.9 percent. Charlottetown, Prince Edward Island, and Sudbury and Thunder Bay, Ontario, each posted 0.3 percent monthly decline, the largest decrease in the country, Statistics Canada said.
On a yearly basis, prices rose 2.5 percent, up from March's 1.6 percent rise. Vancouver posted a particularly strong year-over-year price increase of 6 percent, the agency said.
A harmonized sales tax goes into effect in Ontario, Canada's most populous province, and in British Columbia, a big Western province, July 1. The tax combines the goods and services tax and provincial sales tax into a single sales tax and is expected to dampen the housing market, the CBC said.
Several builders in Ontario and British Columbia are already including the HST in the prices of some of their new houses.
The Bank of Canada, which had kept its key interest rate at record lows for more than a year, raised the rate last week.
OTTAWA, (UPI) -- Canadian new home prices rose 0.3 percent, up a 10th straight month, the government's statistics agency said Thursday.
The April figures, matching March's gain, indicated prices rose in 11 of 21 metropolitan areas, fell in four and were unchanged in six, Statistics Canada said.
St. John's, Newfoundland and Labrador led the country with a 1.1 percent gain. Builders in all three cities said rising material and labor costs were key factors in the price increases, the Canadian Broadcasting Corp. reported.
Regina and Saskatoon, both in Saskatchewan, followed at 0.9 percent. Charlottetown, Prince Edward Island, and Sudbury and Thunder Bay, Ontario, each posted 0.3 percent monthly decline, the largest decrease in the country, Statistics Canada said.
On a yearly basis, prices rose 2.5 percent, up from March's 1.6 percent rise. Vancouver posted a particularly strong year-over-year price increase of 6 percent, the agency said.
A harmonized sales tax goes into effect in Ontario, Canada's most populous province, and in British Columbia, a big Western province, July 1. The tax combines the goods and services tax and provincial sales tax into a single sales tax and is expected to dampen the housing market, the CBC said.
Several builders in Ontario and British Columbia are already including the HST in the prices of some of their new houses.
The Bank of Canada, which had kept its key interest rate at record lows for more than a year, raised the rate last week.