Ashley Ford
Province
Vancouver new home-building costs are out of step with the rest of the country. In fact they actually diminished slightly in August, while the rest of Canada saw costs rise an average 0.5 per cent last month over July.
Fourteen of 21 urban centres surveyed registered monthly increases. Six centres saw no change while Vancouver registered the only monthly decease of 0.2 per cent due to builders quoting lower prices because of competition.
On an annual basis, prices rose in all centres surveyed except Windsor, Ont., where there was no change. In Vancouver, they are up 3.5 per cent from a year ago.
Significant monthly price increases were observed in Hamilton, Saskatoon, Regina, Toronto, St. Catharines-Niagara, Ont., and Saint John-Moncton-Fredericton, mostly because of increased material and labour costs.
Higher land values were noted in Hamilton and Regina. Prices also rose in St. John‘s, Nfld., Kitchener-Waterloo and Sudbury-Thunder Bay in Ontario, Calgary and Edmonton.
For the sixth consecutive month, Quebec posted the largest 12-month increase for new homes at 9.3 per cent. Victoria was next with an increase of 8.4 per cent, followed by Montreal at 7.1 per cent.
Meanwhile, non-residential building by businesses and governments recorded its fifth consecutive quarterly gain in the third quarter, reaching a record $6.6 billion, says Statistics Canada. But in Vancouver, non-residential starts are running 7.1 per cent behind where they were a year earlier.
© Copyright 2003 The Province
