Calgary's condo market continues to cool despite steady growth across Canada

The new condo market is cooling faster in Calgary than anywhere else in Canada.

The price tag for new condominium apartments inthe city continues to drop, with a high number of unsold apartments listed across Calgary, according to Statistics Canada.

Ann-Marie Lurie, chief economist at the Calgary Real Estate Board, said the2015 recession is to blame.

"It's been an oversupplied market for quite some time and that's caused those prices to continue to trend down," she said.

The agency's experimental new condominium apartment price index, reported quarterly,measures markets in Montreal, Ottawa, Toronto, Calgary, Vancouver and Victoria.

It found that both Calgary and Montreal experienced declines throughout 2018 andduring the first quarter of 2019 while other major cities experienced steady growth.

Theprice index for Calgary has decreased almost 16 per cent since early 2018 a trend that's been ongoing since the first index series in 2017

Lurie said theresell condo market in Calgary is also struggling.

As of May's numbers, a typical apartment-style condo is being resold for $248,000 in Calgary. During the highs of 2014,those dwellingswere resold for $300,000 and up, Lurie said.

There's a need for either supply or demand to adjust in order to increasesales activity, she said, adding an additional challenge is the competition from Calgary's rental market.

Montreal also saw its largest year over year decrease, a decline of about six per cent, since the first index. Nearly 19 per cent fewer new apartment units were sold in the city, while apartments and other units were down almost two per cent.

Meanwhile, on average across the six Canadian cities, new condo prices rose about six per cent over past year.

Last year's growth was driven by Vancouver and Toronto, whose markets continue to grow at a steady pace.

Toronto and Victoria saw minor increases, 1.1 and 0.5 per cent, respectively, during the first quarter of 2019. Vancouver's market rose 2.5 per cent.