Canada’s housing starts trend was essentially unchanged in September, while actual starts in urban centres fell 11 per cent from a year earlier, according to the Canada Mortgage and Housing Corp. (CMHC).
The six-month moving average of seasonally adjusted annual housing starts edged up 0.6 per cent to 250,411 units in September, indicating little change in the underlying pace of residential construction.
Actual housing starts in centres with populations of 10,000 or more totalled 19,984 units in September, down from 22,375 in the same month of 2025. From January through September, starts in those centres reached 170,964 units, a 4 per cent decline from the corresponding period last year.
Construction activity shows mixed results
Despite the year-over-year decline in actual starts, the seasonally adjusted annual rate (SAAR) of housing starts across Canada increased 3 per cent in September to 248,896 units, compared with 242,223 in August.
The number of housing units under construction in centres with populations of 50,000 or more remained flat month over month at 371,617 units in September. Completions declined 0.9 per cent from August to 17,398 units, while the number of units with approved building permits that had not yet started construction rose 1.1 per cent to 143,929.
The estimated monthly SAAR for rural housing starts was 18,094 units.
CMHC Deputy Chief Economist Aled ab Iorwerth said the slowdown in construction poses a risk to Canada's efforts to address its housing supply needs, even as housing markets soften across the country.
"As outlined in CMHC's latest Housing Supply Report (HSR), a key risk for Canada now is not building enough during this period of softening housing markets across the country. Of Canada's four most populous provinces, only Quebec has seen modest gains in housing starts for 2026 and each of the seven major centres covered in the HSR are behind 2025's pace for new home construction. Canada still faces a long-term housing supply gap and unless housing construction levels increase, improvements in housing affordability since 2023 will be difficult to sustain."
Major markets record different trends
Housing-start trends varied among Canada's three largest census metropolitan areas in September, with changes in multi-unit construction influencing the results.
Montreal recorded an 8 per cent month-over-month decline in its six-month trend, driven by lower multi-unit starts. Vancouver's trend increased 6 per cent, reflecting higher multi-unit starts.
Toronto's trend remained unchanged as movements in single-detached and multi-unit construction offset each other.
CMHC uses the six-month trend alongside the monthly SAAR to provide a clearer picture of upcoming housing supply. The corporation says monthly annualized estimates can fluctuate considerably, particularly because multi-unit construction can drive overall market activity and vary significantly from one month to the next.
The trend measure is calculated using a six-month moving average of the seasonally adjusted annual rate of total housing starts across Canada. The monthly SAAR provides a separate measure of the pace of construction, expressed as though the month's activity continued for a full year.