The Canadian Real Estate Association says home sales in August were down compared with a year ago as a fresh round of economic challenges threaten to dampen housing market momentum for the remainder of the year.
The organization said home sales last month totalled 37,504, down 6.9 per cent from August 2025.
On a seasonally adjusted basis, activity fell 0.7 per cent compared with July of this year.
Overall, sales activity and price trends were largely unchanged for a fourth consecutive month, CREA senior economist Shaun Cathcart said in a news release.
“What has changed is the broader economic environment, with the Bank of Canada recently warning of rising inflation risks, along with doubts about the durability of recent economic growth,” he said.
“For borrowers, fixed mortgage rates have already increased on higher bond yields. Meanwhile, on the variable rate side, a rate hike is not only back on the table for this year but already priced in by markets. This fresh round of incoming headwinds is expected to dampen the prospects for further housing market momentum heading into 2027.”
Potential buyers are staying “patient” in the face of those risks, said Scott Moulton, a Halifax-based real estate agent for Royal LePage Atlantic.
He said it was a “very quiet” summer for real estate activity in the region he serves, even though Halifax tends to be less prone to extreme swings in activity and pricing trends compared with larger cities.
“The thing that we’re all kind of dealing with and hanging over us is the tariffs and the job insecurity,” Moulton said in an interview on Tuesday.
“People are confident in the market here. They’re confident in investing. There’s ... just the buyer pause right now.”
Absent any pressure, Moulton said many are content to wait on the sidelines to see how those factors play out.
“It’s like, ‘Well, I don’t have to write an offer right now, I could wait to see what’s coming up,’” he said.
“There’s just a little bit more patience in the markets.”
The national average sale price of a home sold in August was $668,219, up 0.6 per cent on a year-over-year basis.
CREA’s home price index, which aims to represent the sale of typical homes, was stable between July and August. The index was down three per cent on a year-over-year basis.
BMO senior economist Robert Kavcic said the figures describe a “soft” market by historical standards but “not completely tapped out.”
“Canada’s housing market has been stable through the summer, and conditions remain balanced at the national level. Volumes and prices continue to carve out bottoms in the hardest-hit markets, but the recovery is going to be flat with little in the pipeline to trigger a sharp rebound,” he said in a note.
While Canada’s largest markets — southern Ontario and much of B.C. — are still lagging, Kavcic said sales were down across most regions year-over-year.
“This is all indicative of a market that is working to turn over the homes that need turning over, and not much more — speculation is gone, investors are absent, and prices are holding flat alongside low and stable volumes,” he said.
CREA said new listings in August were up 3.3 per cent month-over-month, ending a streak of three straight declines earlier in the summer.
There were just under 200,000 properties listed for sale across Canada at the end of August, up 1.4 per cent from a year earlier and in line with the long-term average for that time of year.
The association said the uptick in inventory was broad based across Canada’s largest markets and most apparent toward the end of the month, suggesting sellers hoped to get an early start to the fall market.
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Sammy Hudes, The Canadian Press
This report by The Canadian Press was first published Sept. 15, 2026.