Clusters of condominiums in Toronto are photographed on Jan. 30, 2018.Fred Lum/The Globe and Mail
Toronto's condominium market hit another market milestone as the number of proposed apartments in the Greater Toronto Area passed 380,152 units in 2017, according to a study by market analysts Urbanation Inc.
"Proposed" simply means a development application has been submitted, which may or may not be approved. But that figure is up 6.4 per cent from the 2016's end-of-year tally of 357,090.
If one regarded the figure as a measure of developer interest, it's up 49 per cent from just five years ago, when, in 2012, there were 253,768 apartments proposed.
That ever-widening pipeline comes as 2017 was a record year for sales. An Altus Group report on the city's condo market said the 36,429 units sold in the year smashed the previous record set in 2016 (29,132 units).
Urbanation reports a smaller number of condo apartments are on the market in preconstruction sales, about 40,149, and there are about 58,900 units under construction right now. In another record, 105 projects representing 32,435 units, launched preconstruction sales in 2017.
Even though more units are being planned, sold and constructed, 2017 hit a five-year low in terms of delivering completed units to market. Just 13,513 units were made ready for occupancy in the year, down 24 per cent from the 2016 tally. It extends a three-year streak of declining deliveries from 2014's high of 21,133.
Urbanation expects almost 10,000 more units will be finished in 2018, reaching 22,395 units, with 25,124 units projected for 2019, and 28,432 in 2020.
"The level of activity under way is putting the industry under tremendous pressure to push the units through the development cycle," Shaun Hildebrand, Urbanation's senior vice-president, wrote in the company's fourth quarter report for 2017.
Even though the signs are there that supply is increasing, the market remains hot: The average selling price for the year was $795 a square foot, but jumped to $972 per square foot in the downtown core. By the end of the year, average pricing for the remaining units surpassed $1,079, the first time sales crossed that thousand-dollar-a-square-foot threshold.
170 Avenue Road is a new building in a desirable area near Toronto's Yorkville neighbourhood. This two-bed, three-bath luxury apartment was on the market for just three days before selling for $1,550,000, $20,000 under the asking price.
Shane Dingman