Held again, while the listings pile up
A second hold. Prime stays at 4.95%, and if you are in a variable rate your payment in June is the one you made in May.
The more interesting number this month is not the Bank's. May brought 21,819 new listings to the GTA against 6,244 sales, pushing active inventory to 30,964 and months of supply to 4.3 — the loosest spring market in years. The average sale price was $1,120,879, essentially flat against a year ago.
What that means in practice is that the negotiation has moved. In a 3-month market you compete on speed and firm offers. At 4.3 months you have room for a financing condition, a home inspection, and a price discussion — and those are worth far more than the quarter point everyone is waiting for. A 5% discount on a $1.1 million purchase is $55,000. Two quarter-point cuts on the resulting mortgage are worth about $250 a month. The price is the bigger lever, and it is the one that is actually available to you right now.
If you are buying, the thing to sort out before you write is what you qualify for and what your down payment does to it — particularly if you are near the $1.5 million cap, where the required down payment jumps from $125,000 to $300,000 as you cross the line.
What the Bank said
“The Bank of Canada today maintained its target for the overnight rate at 2.75%, with the Bank Rate at 3% and the deposit rate at 2.70%. Since the April Monetary Policy Report, the US administration has continued to increase and decrease various tariffs.”
The rate path around this decision
For context, unemployment was running at about 6.9% and inflation at 1.9% around this decision.
Where this leaves you
Rate announcements make headlines; approvals turn on your own numbers. If you're buying, renewing or refinancing in Toronto, the useful next step is finding out what you actually qualify for — see current rates, run the math, or start an application. You can also follow the local market in our Toronto housing market reports.