Market conditions vary from year-to-year, season-to-season, price range-to-price range and from one market sub-district to another. There’s always a reason for market conditions and many times there are several factors at play – often times conflicting factors that balance or moderate the effect of any one of the market influences.

Buyer’s Market vs. Seller‘s Market is the normal terminology to describe a surplus of listing inventory or a short supply relative to the demand from potential buyers. Prices rise when supply is reduced (i.e. upward pressure applied by bidding buyers chasing the “best” of the available supply). Prices stabilize or fall when a diminished number of buyers “pick and choose” among a wide supply in their target market niche.

It is not quite as simple as supply and demand, but essentially all the other factors (weather, school-year timetable, interest rates, supply of mortgage money, availability of   new types/styles of construction, general economic confidence, immigration, job security, industrial cycles … in short - local, national & world-wide economics) influence people’s needs/desires to buy and or sell their homes and investment residential properties.

Despite the 'local' and 'current' market conditions, certain principles remain true. The most basic fundamental is an understanding of what residential real estate is:

* SHELTER - everybody must live somewhere. Ownership is superior to tenancy.

* COMMUNITY - most people choose to live near others who share their goals and expectations and shun areas beneath those ideal.

* A LONG TERM INVESTMENT - ALL Canadian Urban real property purchases are wise and prudent investments after a twenty-year holding period. Some purchases pay-off quicker, some have bumps along the way, but after 20 years EVERY buy is a GREAT BUY.

Residential Real Estate (3-unit or less dwelling) is rarely:

*A Speculative Investment - “buy & flip“ only works in the initial phases of an Upturn,

*A Tax Shelter - buying for tax-savings is a short-term strategy guaranteed only to create the intended short-term tax-savings.

Real Estate in the Greater Metro Toronto Area is always going to be a good investment because this is where the jobs are created and therefore where people tend to gravitate. Greater Toronto is the Financial, Social, Entertainment and Transportation Capital of Canada.