Why Canadian Home Sales Stalled — Confidence, Rates & Delinquencies

Housing affordability in Canada is the best it has been in years. Prices have come down, rates have sat at relatively low levels for months, and on paper the math works better today than it has in a long time. So why has the market gone quiet?

In this episode I connect the dots between inflation, fuel costs, tariffs, bond yields and the housing market, and land on the piece almost everyone overlooks: consumer confidence. Buyers who can afford to move are choosing not to, and that single factor explains more about this market than any rate table will.

WHAT I COVER
- Why home sales slowed even as affordability improved
- CPI at 3 percent, and 2.2 percent stripped of food and fuel
- How fuel and tariffs push inflation, and the box that puts the Bank of Canada in
- Bond yields, the recent lender moves, and the 5 percent line I watch
- Consumer confidence as the real driver of buyer behaviour
- Why the employment numbers lead everything else
- Variable versus fixed: the spread, the risk, and the two questions to ask
- Mortgage delinquencies in Canada and Ontario, low but trending up

KEY TAKEAWAYS
1. Affordability is not the problem right now. Confidence is.
2. Food and fuel are the inflation drivers that hit households hardest, and they are the ones moving.
3. Watch the employment numbers. They tell you where this goes before anything else does.
4. Before taking a variable, answer two questions honestly: can you carry the risk, and where do you think prime goes from here?
5. Delinquencies are still low, but the direction matters more than the number, and the data is roughly six months old.
6. Never just sign the renewal letter. Get advice first.

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Stephen Green, Mortgage Broker — The Financial Collective | Better Mortgage Choice, FSRA Lic. #13496