TORONTO, September 4, 2014 -- Toronto Real Estate Board

TORONTO, September 4, 2014 -- Toronto Real estate Board President Paul Etherington reported 7,600 sales through the TorontoMLS system in August 2014. This result was up by 2.8 % compared against 7,391 transactions reported in August 2013. Year-to-date sales through the end of Aug amounted to 65,454, which represented an increase of 6.5 percent compared to the same period in 2013. "The last full month of summer finished on a high note. As we look towards the fall market, I predict that demand for possession housing will stay strong. House buyers may continue to benefit from a diversity of affordable home possession opportunities throughout the GTA. The incontrovertible fact that sales were up for all the main home types in August implies that first-time buyers and existing property owners remain awfully active in today's marketplace," said Mr. Etherington. The average selling price in Aug 2014 was $546,303 up 8.9 % in comparison to the average of $501,677 reported in Aug 2013. The year-to-date average pricetag through Aug was $562,504, which represented an increase of 8.5 percent in contrast to the same period in 2013. "The number of lists in August was down contrasted to last year, while the amount of sales increased. This indicates that sellers' market conditions remained in place with plenty of competition between customers. This is the reason why we continued to see robust price expansion last month. Looking forward, if sales growth continues to outstrip listings expansion, the average selling price should keep on increasing on a year-over-year basis," said Jason Mercer, TREB's Director of Market Analysis .

Bank of Canada stays neutral on 1% policy rate as economic slack persists

http://www.financialpost.com/m/wp/news/blog.html?b=business.financialpost.com/2014/09/03/bank-of-canada-keeps-rate-at-1-for-fifth-year-in-row&pubdate=2014-09-03