A report from the Wall Street Journal on Canada. "Tougher rules for new borrowers, rising mortgage rates and new taxes for home buyers have been put in place by Canadian regulators in recent years to tame some of the most overheated housing markets in the developed world. "

"But they have also shut prospective homeowners out of the market. That has slowed sales in cities like Toronto and Vancouver in recent months, prompting some to call for Canada to loosen the restrictions lest they brake the economy too much."

"Evan Siddall, a former Goldman Sachs banker who now runs Canada’s housing agency, is unmoved. In fact, he doesn’t think the tougher rules go far enough. 'Residential real estate has become too large a part of our economy, and it’s diverting investment,' he said in an interview. 'You can’t build a country on making houses for the country.'"

"For the housing industry, the rules have been painful. Home sales in the Vancouver region plunged more than 42% in November from a year earlier, following a 35% drop in October, according to the Real Estate Board of Greater Vancouver."

"'We understand why this was done,' said Canadian Home Builders’ Association spokesman David Foster. 'But it seems to have done what the government wanted to do, and from hereon in mostly what we are going to see are a lot of negative side effects unless that policy is recalibrated and rethought.'"

"The rules also threaten to worsen income inequality by keeping young families from building wealth, said Paul Taylor, CEO of Mortgage Professionals Canada. 'It’s a bit of a nanny state when you say, ‘We don’t think it’s in your best interest to buy property at that level now,’ said Mr. Taylor."

"'We had to make it harder for people who were borrowing with too little equity to expose themselves to the housing market. And that’s first-time home buyers,' Mr. Siddall said. We actually probably could have done more.'"

From Better Dwelling. "Greater Toronto new homes sales are cooling. BILD and Altus Group numbers show sales dropped to multi-year lows in November. The decline in sales is combining with higher building activity, sending inventory higher than we’ve seen in the past few years."

"The price of a new home is up… or down – depending on what you’re going to buy. The benchmark price of condo apartment reached $786,602 in November, up 11.9% from last year. The price for a single family home hit $1,150,823, down 5.9% from last year."

"The City of Toronto saw new home sales fall much faster than the suburbs. The City of Toronto represented 1,141 of the total GTA sales in November, down 53.35% from last year. Condo apartments represented 1,124 of the sales in the city, which was down 53.64% from last year. As you’ve probably noticed, the vast majority of the sales declines were in Toronto."

"New homes for sales is surging higher across Greater Toronto. An estimated 16,797 new homes were for sale across Greater Toronto in November, up 42.49% from last year. Condos represented 11,254 of those listings, up 34.77% from last year. The number is higher than we’ve seen during the past two years."

"Inventory is now just above historic levels, which sounds great when the industry says it. However, sales are significantly below historic levels. That means more pressure on home prices to stay where they are, or even drop."

From York Region. "Her facial expression changed from neutral to complete disgust. She was a gym goer, like me, and somehow both of us learned about the grim news when we were briefly looking at the TV screen in the women’s locker-room in East Gwillimbury."

"On Wednesday, Dec. 19, Humberto Velasquez, 34, was shot multiple times near King Street West and Spadina Avenue, so close to the hipster-ish BrainStation, a training centre for really smart-looking people, who earnestly want to reach their full potential in 'geekiness' and 'nerdiness.' It was also in an area known as fun-loving a.k.a. the Entertainment District."

"But that face of disgust isn’t exclusive to responding to news emanating from Toronto. These faces were made this year when hundreds of former Icona and Cosmos condo purchasers were 'out-priced' from the continuously appreciating real estate market after the developers decided to scrap the projects citing the inability to secure 'satisfactory financing.'"

"Their challenge is worsened when developers need more incentives to make profit amid already high prices for real estate. It gets even more complicated as there is no shortage of land to develop as York Region officials admit: “We have quite a years-of-supply, about 21 to 23 years' supply.'"

From Portage Online. "The Portage la Prairie housing market saw its fair share of movement during the past year. Portage la Prairie Chamber of Commerce President Guy Moffat says the market overall, was up and down more than really trending in a certain direction."

"'It was sort of a mixed bag in 2018,' says Moffat. 'The housing market, as far as sales go, at the start of the year it was quite hot. There was a lot moving, it was a very exciting time. Then, over the summer, which is when it's normally supposed to be busy, things kind of dried up a bit.'"

"Moffat notes in the past month and a half the market has shown an upward trend, most likely the result of an increased amount of inventory. He notes the main issue appears to be finding appropriate prices for the market."

"In 2019, Moffat says the biggest news will be the massive influx of inventory into the rental market. 'We've got two large-scale apartment complexes that are coming up,' notes Moffat."