August 2016 Housing Starts in Kitchener-Cambridge-Waterloo

TORONTO, ONTARIO--(Marketwired - Sept. 8, 2016) - Housing starts in the Kitchener-Cambridge-Waterloo Census Metropolitan Area (CMA) were trending down at 3,727 units in August compared to 3,785 units in July, according to Canada Mortgage and Housing Corporation (CMHC). The trend is a six month moving average of the monthly seasonally adjusted annual rates (SAAR) of housing starts.

"Total housing starts trended slightly lower in August as the decrease in apartment starts was higher than the increase in starts for low-rise housing types. Strong single-detached starts this year have pushed the trend for total starts slightly above a level consistent with the rate of household formation for the past two months," said Erica McLerie, Senior Market Analyst at CMHC. "Job growth, in-migration and a very tight resale market have translated into strong demand for new homes."

CMHC uses the trend measure as a complement to the monthly SAAR of housing starts to account for considerable swings in monthly estimates and obtain a more complete picture of the state of the housing market. In some situations, analysing only SAAR data can be misleading in some markets, as they are largely driven by the multiples segment of the markets which can be quite variable from one month to the next. The multiples segment includes apartments, rows and semi-detached homes.

The SAAR of total housing starts was 3,520 units in August, down from 7,559 units in July. The decrease in the SAAR measure was primarily due to a lower number of apartment starts. Actual total housing starts for the first eight months of 2016 reached 2,370 units, up 19.5 per cent compared to the same period in 2015.

Preliminary Housing Starts data is also available in English and French at the following link: Preliminary Housing Starts Tables.

As Canada's authority on housing, CMHC contributes to the stability of the housing market and financial system, provides support for Canadians in housing need, and offers objective housing research and information to Canadian governments, consumers and the housing industry.

For more information, visit our website at www.cmhc.ca or follow us on Twitter, YouTube, LinkedIn and Facebook.

Additional data is available upon request.

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To view the graph and tables associated with this release, please visit the following link: http://media3.marketwire.com/docs/cmhc0908kcwe.pdf.