May home sales down 4.3% from year ago, but activity up month-over-month

The Canadian Real Estate Association says home sales in May fell 4.3% compared with a year ago, although activity picked up from the previous month.

Home sales rose 3.6% from April, marking the first month-over-month increase at the national level in more than six months.

CREA senior economist Shaun Cathcart says that after buyers sat on the sidelines for much of 2025 so far, there is a sense that “maybe the expected turnaround in housing activity this year was just delayed for a few months by the initial tariff chaos and uncertainty.”

The association also says new listings rose 3.1% month over month.

There were 201,880 properties listed for sale across Canada at the end of May, up 13.2% from a year earlier but still 5% below the long-term average for the month of around 211,500 listings.

The actual national average sale price of a home sold in May was $691,299, down 1.8% from a year ago.

Sammy Hudes, The Canadian Press

Sammy Hudes is a reporter with The Canadian Press, a national news agency headquartered in Toronto and founded in 1917.