December 2012 Housing Starts in Toronto

TORONTO, ONTARIO--(Marketwire - Jan. 9, 2013) - Housing starts in Toronto Census Metropolitan Area (CMA) were trending at 48,100 units in December, according to Canada Mortgage and Housing Corporation (CMHC). The trend is a six month moving average of the monthly seasonally adjusted annual rates (SAAR) ¹ of housing starts. The standalone monthly SAAR was 50,000 units in December, up from 37,300 in November.

"December capped off a strong 2012 for housing starts, which were influenced by condo pre-sales during 2011. However, starts for both singles and multiples have been generally trending lower during the past several months," said Shaun Hildebrand, CMHC's Senior Market Analyst for Toronto.

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.

Single detached starts added 976 actual units while multiple starts totalled 3,291 actual units in December 2012. Singles were lower than in December of last year while multiples were higher. Year- end total starts reached 48,105 actual units in 2012, which is ahead of the 39,745 recorded for 2011.

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

As Canada's national housing agency, CMHC draws on more than 65 years of experience to help Canadians access a variety of quality, environmentally sustainable and affordable housing solutions. CMHC also provides reliable, impartial and up-to-date housing market reports, analysis and knowledge to support and assist consumers and the housing industry in making informed decisions.

¹ All starts figures in this release, other than actual starts and the trend estimate, are seasonally adjusted annual rates (SAAR) - that is, monthly figures adjusted to remove normal seasonal variation and multiplied by 12 to reflect annual levels. By removing seasonal ups and downs, seasonal adjustment allows for a comparison from one season to the next and from one month to the next. Reporting monthly figures at annual rates indicates the annual level of starts that would be obtained if the monthly pace was maintained for 12 months. This facilitates comparison of the current pace of activity to annual forecasts as well as to historical annual levels.

Follow CMHC on Twitter @CMHC_ca.

Additional data is available upon request.

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To view the table and graph associated with this press release, please visit the following link: http://media3.marketwire.com/docs/CMHC(EN)-84552.pdf.