B.C. housing starts declined 9.1% in October following a similar pattern across much of Canada.
According to figures released by Canada Mortgage and Housing Corp. (CMHC) on Monday, the seasonally adjusted rate of urban housing starts in B.C. was 24,000 units in October compared with 26,400 units in September.
Carol Frketich, a B.C.-based CMHC spokeswoman, told BIV that while there were 24,000 housing starts in B.C. last month, demand due to population growth is estimated to be closer to 28,000 to 30,000 housing starts.
“These past few months there has been more supply of existing homes for sale – so buyers have a choice,” she said.
She noted job growth and a strong labour market in B.C. should bring actual housing starts closer in line with population-driven demand forecasts in the coming months.
“We have a good basis of fundamentals for housing demand in B.C.,” she said.
There were 1,447 housing starts in October in Metro Vancouver, bringing the area’s year-to-date total to 12,584 homes.
Builders started 1,059 multiple family homes in Metro Vancouver last month, of which 206 were townhouses and 116 were homes with secondary suites.
More than half of the new townhouse developments in B.C. were in Surrey and Langley, while the majority of new homes with secondary suites were in Vancouver and Coquitlam.
Abbotsford was one of the few large cities in B.C. to experience an increase in housing starts.
It recorded 67 housing starts last month, compared with 52 starts during the same month last year.
For the first ten months of the year, total housing starts in Abbotsford reached 418, compared with 298 during the same period in 2009.
While urban starts in Atlantic Canada increased by 32.9%, all other regions of Canada experienced decline.
October’s seasonally adjusted annual rate of urban starts decreased by 24.5% in Ontario, 16.9% in the Prairie region and 2.6% in Quebec.
The CMHC said housing starts in Canada in 2011 would gradually catch up to demographic-driven demand.