House prices are falling in Canada, rising in the U.S. — why the difference?

Published in Housing Finance International.

Canada and the United States both span the North American continent, sharing a 3,900- mile border running between the Atlantic and Pacific Oceans. In GDP, the U.S. is more than twelve times as big, but they are both rich, economically advanced countries, with sophisticated financial systems and active housing finance markets, and similar home ownership ratios of about 66%.

The central banks of both countries practiced extreme “quantitative easing” to suppress interest rates and expand credit; both the Federal Reserve and the Bank of Canada multiplied their total assets to nine times in 2021 what they were in 2008; both central banks reduced short term interest rates to nearly zero in response to the Covid crisis. Both countries experienced a massive house price bubble, which took average house prices by 2022 to far above the former housing bubble peaks of 2006 (U.S.) and 2008 (Canada).

With both countries suffering runaway inflation in 2022, both central banks rapidly pushed short-term interest rates up to about 5% and started “quantitative tightening,” letting their balance sheets shrink. The mortgage interest rates in both countries more than doubled, the standard Canadian five-year mortgage rate jumping from 2.4% to 5.5%, and the standard U.S. 30-year mortgage rate from a low of 2.7% to over 7%. (But note the difference between a very low interest rate fixed for five years and one fixed for 30 years, as discussed further below.)

In both countries, the house buyers’ monthly interest payments for a new mortgage loan of the same size has more than doubled. A normal expectation is that this should be making house prices fall. In Canada, they have indeed fallen, but in the U.S., average house prices have been rising.

As of January 2024, average Canadian house prices have dropped more than 18% from their peak of March 2022, although they of course vary by region. In greater Toronto, Canada’s largest city, for example, house prices are 20% down from their peak; in the Hamilton-Burlington area, down 25%. On the other hand, in the oil and gas capital of Calgary, in western Canada, house prices have reached a new all-time high. On average, across the country, house prices are down significantly from their peak, but the peak was steep, and house prices are still historically high. It would not be surprising for them to continue their decline.

In contrast, U.S. average house prices, after dipping about 5% after their June 2022 peak, are back over it. The S&P Case Shiller national house price index was 308.3 at that peak, in December 2023 it was 310.7, in spite of the greatly increased mortgage interest rates. According to the AEI Housing Center (AEI), year-over-year U.S. average house price appreciation,1 measured monthly, has always been positive from 2022 to early 2024, and in January 2024 the year-over-year house price increase was 6.4%. AEI predicts a 5% average U.S. house price increase for the full year 2024.2

Of course, there is regional variation. Along the Pacific coast, San Francisco prices are down 13% from their 2022 peak, Seattle down over 12%, and Portland down about 8%. On the other side of the country, Miami and New York City have made new highs.

An interesting surprise is that the fastest house price appreciation is now in the mid-sized, Midwestern cities of Indianapolis, Indiana; Grand Rapids, Michigan; and Milwaukee, Wisconsin; all far from the Sun Belt and where they have a real winter. House prices are up over the last year by 13% in Indianapolis, 12% in Grand Rapids and about 11% in Milwaukee.

Overall, the U.S. looks not only different from Canada, but an exception to what the Financial Times described as “the widespread drop in global house prices that hit advanced economies” and “the deepest property downturn in a decade.”3

The U.S. house price behavior is even more notable when combined with its dramatic shrinkage of the volumes of house purchases and of mortgage originations. The volume of mortgages for house purchases in early February 2024 was 35% less than it was in 2019, before the Covid crisis. It was 10% below the already weak same period in 2023. Refinance mortgages with cash taken out were down 60% from 2019, and refinance mortgages with no cash out were down 75%.

With these drops in business volumes, U.S. mortgage banks, which rely on an originate-tosell business model, are in their own recession. United Wholesale Mortgage, the top mortgage originator in 2023 with $108 billion in mortgage loans, was second in 2022 with $127 billion. Its volume was thus down 15% and it posted a loss of $70 million for 2023. Rocket Mortgage, the top originator in 2022 with $133 billion in loans originated, was second in 2023 with $79 billion, or down 41% in volume. It made a 2023 annual loss of $390 million. “One of the worst quarters for mortgage origination in recent history,” said its chief financial officer about the end of 2023.4

How can prices still be rising when volumes are so reduced, and interest rates are so much higher? The most common explanation is that the supply of houses for sale also remains low. Among many others, AEI observes the “historically tight supply.”5

Contributing to the tight supply is that people with 3% or less 30-year mortgages are less inclined to sell and give up the striking financial advantage of the cheap mortgage, which is locked in for a very long time, as long as they stay in the house. There is no way to monetize the large value of that existing mortgage to the borrower except by staying put.

A key difference between the Canadian and U.S. mortgage markets, which presumably affects the house price behavior, is the contrast between a typical five-year mortgage and a typical 30-year mortgage, respectively. With low- rate mortgages from three years ago, for example, the Canadian homeowners have only two years left of value from the cheap financing. The new, higher rates work their way into the household finances much more quickly. After the same three years, the American homeowners have 27 years of a large, valuable liability left—a new, higher rate is very far off indeed, if they keep the house. But if they sell it, the mortgage is due on sale, and they will face the new, more than doubled interest rate right away.

The unique American political and financial commitment to the 30-year fixed rate mortgage is now suppressing the supply of houses for sale and helping hold up house prices, postponing the correction of the 21st century’s second house price bubble, and making American houses less affordable for new buyers. This is certainly an unintended consequence of U.S. national housing finance policy.

The provocative financial writer, Wolf Richter, suggests that the causality runs not only from low supply of houses for sale to higher prices, but also the other way around. “Now the hope for lower mortgage rates is holding back potential buyers and potential sellers alike,” he writes. “The housing market remains frozen because prices are still too high.”6 On a historical basis, it appears that both Canadian and U.S. house prices are still too high. The difference between their principal mortgage instruments is one factor explaining why prices have been falling in one and rising in the other, as we continue to live through the distortions of and adjustments to the Covid crisis.

It might be argued that the U.S. housing finance system would be improved by less subsidy for and less political devotion to the 30-year mortgage. There could be more emphasis on 15-year mortgages instead, which have less interest rate risk and create a faster build-up of housing equity for the borrower. A gradual transition by changing the rules applied to the government mortgage promoters, Fannie Mae, Freddie Mac and the Federal Housing Administration, could be imagined. However, the political probability of such a change is zero.

__________________

1 A better name for this measure would be “house price change,” since there of course can be “depreciation” as well as “appreciation.” But we seem to be stuck with the “HPA” term. “Appreciation,” it is true, has prevailed on average over time, especially in nominal, as opposed to inflation-adjusted terms. Inflation-adjusted U.S. year-over-year house prices were falling from November 2022 to June 2023, but remained positive in nominal terms, as reported by AEI.

2 “Home Price Appreciation (HPA) Index—January 2024,” AEI Housing Center.

3 “Global house price downturn shows signs of reversal as rate-cut hopes rise,” Financial Times, February 26, 2024.

4 “Rocket posts $233 million net loss in 4Q,” National Mortgage News, February 22, 2024.

5 “Housing Finance Watch, 2024 Week 6,” AEI Housing Center.

6 “Mortgage Rates Rise Back to 7%, Housing Market Re-Freezes, Buyers’ Strike Continues. Prices Are Just Too High,” Wolf Street, February 21, 2024.