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A new report released this week looks back at last year's real estate trends, and suggests what buyers and sellers should expect in 2024.

Home resale transactions rebounded month-over-month just as the year was closing out, a report by RBC shows.

This data encompasses transactions of all housing types across Canada and is seasonally adjusted and annualized, the report published on Monday read.

WHAT TO EXPECT THIS YEAR

It's too soon for official reports, but Lauren Haw, Zoocasa's broker of record and industry relations, told CTVNews.ca that there appears to have been a "pickup" of sales in January, when compared to the same month last year.

"We're seeing some sales of homes that were sitting on the market in the fall," she said.

Reports about interest rates possibly stabilizing and dropping in 2024 are giving buyers hope, Haw said.

"That's giving buyers security and so they're feeling like they can now make decisions," she said. "I do expect to see good sales activity in January coming off of what I would have considered a stable December."

Still, she said, that is being compared to an "incredibly quiet" 2023.

RBC's experts said they believe the softness noted last month will persist into the first half of this year.

"January won’t bring much clarity either since it’s the second quietest month of the year," the report said. "So any confirmation of a cyclical turning point will have to wait."

BUCKING THE TREND

Experts were seeing a "softening trend" in the Canadian housing market, but and jumped to a "solid" 8.7 per cent in December.

Lower market prices from sellers and "modest" mortgage rate declines are some of the factors that "spurred buyers into action" that final month, RBC economists said.

Home prices "edged down" 0.8 per cent in December, following declines between 0.5 and one per cent in the previous months.

"We’d warn against reading too much into a single month’s burst of activity, especially when it comes at a seasonal low point (December is the quietest period of the year for the housing market)," the report noted.

According to the bank's data, new listings fell for the third straight month — down 5.1 per cent nationwide.

Home prices continued to "drift" lower despite the demand need for supply, the report read.

Haw said the data looks at year-over-year sales for each month, so it doesn't necessarily reflect how sales changed from November 2023 to December 2023.

"It means the number of sales for December over December was relatively higher than November over November," she said.

Zoocasa's data, which looks at the months of 2023, rather than comparing those year-over-year monthly totals, last month.

"From September through to November, we saw a softening in the number of sales and the price points and we saw inventory growing," Haw said. "Whereas in December, which is common, we saw new listings slow down … That allows the market to catch its breath a little bit."

Canadian home sales dropped 24.2 per cent from November to December, while year-over-year December sales were up by 3.7 per cent, according to the data Zoocasa compares for its reports.