Canada housing prices won’t crash: poll

OTTAWA — Canada’s government will make it tougher for many homebuyers to get mortgages this year as it grapples with an overheated property market, according to analysts in a Reuters poll, who also ruled out the prospect that prices could suddenly crash.

Ten of 14 economists and strategists surveyed last week in Reuters’ first poll on the Canadian housing sector answered “yes” when asked if they thought Ottawa would tighten mortgage rules within the next 12 months.

Any move would likely come before the prime spring real estate season, analysts said. “Sometime between now and the next budget,” said Benoit Durocher, senior economist at Desjardins in Montreal, on the timing of such a move.

Housing Market has 2 good years ahead!

Canada’s housing market has two good years ahead of it yet, CMHC said Monday, with low interest rates and a “moderately” expanding economy keeping price corrections at bay.

Canadian banks have recently issued reports probing the consequences of cheap money, and trying to predict whether there is a bubble in prices that will eventually pop and cause prices to crash. They are particularly concerned about Vancouver and Toronto, where some have predicted price corrections of up to 10% because of overbuilding in the condo market.

But CMHC said Monday Canadian markets would “remain steady in 2012 and 2013.”

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