Increases in Canadian house prices over the past five years are the result of a ‘robust economy’, estate agent Century 21 Canada has reported.

Alberta and British Columbia show the most dramatic price increases, said the firm.

The hottest housing markets surveyed in British Columbia were in Vernon, Kelowna and North Vancouver. In Vernon the price of a ‘typical home’ of the sort most often found in the neighbourhood has gone up from £73,400 in the spring of 2001 to a current £168,100 – an increase of 129 per cent. In Kelowna the price has gone up from £87,600 to £165,700, a rise of 89 per cent; and in North Vancouver from £164,800 to £307,800, an increase of 87 per cent.

The hottest housing markets surveyed in Alberta were in Calgary north east, and Fort McMurray. The former had seen the price of a typical house rise from £77,700 in 2001 to £171,900 in the spring of 2006, an increase of 121 per cent. In Fort McMurray the price has increased from £94,700 to £194,200, an increase of 105 per cent.

The survey included 38 markets across the country. Other housing markets demonstrating dramatic price increases included Quebec City, up 67 per cent, and the Winnipeg suburb of St. Vital South, up 64 per cent.

Mortgage rates have also showed a moderate decline over the past five years helping to boost the housing market. The conventional five year mortgage rate was 7.75 per cent in May 2001, 5.7 per cent in June 2005 and 6.75 per cent in May 2006s.

‘The economy continues to provide the job stability and consumer confidence combined with moderate mortgage interest rates to bring continued, stable house price growth on the Prairies, in central Canada and in Atlantic Canada’, said Century 21 Canada president Don Lawby. ‘In British Columbia and Alberta, the same economic factors plus booming energy and construction sectors have produced dramatic house price increases’.


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