Housing starts in the Barrie Census Metropolitan Area (CMA) were trending at 1,268 units in February, down from 1,331 in January according to Canada Mortgage and Housing Corporation (CMHC). The trend is a six month moving average of the monthly seasonally adjusted annual rates (SAAR) of housing starts.
“The housing starts trend fell again in Barrie in February, a month in which starts are usually low,” said Abdellah Massaoudi, CMHC’s market analyst for Barrie. “Starts were limited to few single- detached homes in Innisfil and Springwater Townships while in the City of Barrie, there were no starts. While the scarcity of land continues to restrain single-detached homes construction in the City of Barrie, the cold month of February limited the start of new construction projects.”
CMHC uses the trend measure as a complement to the monthly SAAR of housing starts to account for considerable swings in monthly estimates and obtain a more complete picture of the state of the housing market. In some situations, analysing only SAAR data can be misleading in some markets, as they are largely driven by the multiples segment of the markets which can be quite variable from one month to the next. The multiples segment includes apartments, rows and semi-detached homes.
The standalone monthly SAAR was 356 units in February, down from 723 in January. No multiple-unit homes were started in February.
