TORONTO — New condominium sales in Toronto fell to their lowest level in more than three decades last year, a steep pullback that signals a broader freeze in the city’s once-booming pre-construction market and raises fresh questions about what gets built next in Canada’s largest urban region.
Sales of new condos dropped 60 per cent in 2025 to 1,599 units, according to figures from market research firm Urbanation. The company said the result marked the lowest annual total since 1991 and represented a 95 per cent decline from 2021.
The numbers point to a dramatic shift in a part of the housing pipeline that, for years, played an outsized role in shaping Toronto’s growth — both in the skyline of the core and in the suburban nodes of the Greater Toronto Area.
- New condo sales in 2025: 1,599 units
- Year-over-year change: down 60%
- Change since 2021: down 95%
- Lowest annual sales since: 1991
A market that helped build the modern Toronto skyline
For much of the past two decades, pre-construction condos were a defining feature of the region’s housing story. Towers rose quickly in the downtown core and spread outward along transit corridors, with developers often relying on early buyers to secure financing and move projects from drawings to construction sites.
That model depends on steady demand for new units before shovels hit the ground. When demand weakens, projects can be delayed or reworked — and in some cases, never proceed at all — because the presale thresholds that lenders and developers require become harder to meet.
Urbanation’s latest count suggests that challenge intensified through 2025, culminating in sales levels not seen since the early 1990s. The firm described the slowdown as effectively bringing a previously high-flying industry to a standstill.
Why new condo sales matter beyond buyers and investors
The pre-construction condo market matters to more than would-be owners. In a region where housing demand has long outpaced supply, new condo projects have been a major source of net-new homes — adding units to the market over time, even if the initial buyers were a mix of end-users and investors.
When fewer projects launch and fewer units sell early, it can ripple through the broader system. The immediate effect is visible in the new-build pipeline: fewer commitments can mean fewer cranes, fewer active construction sites, and a slower pace of new homes arriving in future years.
It can also influence what kind of housing ultimately gets delivered. Developers facing weaker presale conditions may pause, redesign, or wait for clearer market signals — decisions that can reshape neighbourhood plans and delay additions to the rental and ownership stock.
Background: how a downturn takes hold in pre-construction
Pre-construction sales are especially sensitive to shifts in affordability and buyer confidence. Unlike resale purchases, which involve an existing home and a near-term move-in date, pre-construction buyers are committing to a product that may take years to complete and deliver.
In that environment, changes in borrowing costs, household finances, and the outlook for resale prices can quickly affect demand. If buyers hesitate, developers can struggle to reach the presale levels that typically unlock construction financing, leading to slower project timelines and fewer new launches.
The 2025 figures from Urbanation capture the result: a sharp year-over-year decline and a multiyear slide from the peak levels seen earlier in the decade.
What happens next
With sales at a multi-decade low, the next phase of Toronto’s condo cycle will hinge on whether demand returns strongly enough to restart the presale engine that many projects rely on. In the short term, low sales volumes can translate into fewer new projects moving ahead on their original schedules.
Developers may focus on smaller launches, phased releases, or design revisions meant to match what buyers are willing to pay. Others may simply hold off until financing conditions and market sentiment improve.
For prospective buyers, the pause could mean fewer choices in the pre-construction market, even as the resale market continues to set the day-to-day price signals that shape confidence. For governments focused on housing supply, the data offers an early warning that today’s slowdown in presales can become tomorrow’s shortfall in completed homes.
Toronto’s condo market has been one of the country’s most prominent housing engines for years. A collapse in new sales to levels last seen in 1991 underscores how quickly that engine can sputter — and why shifts in one segment of the market can have consequences that reach well beyond any single buyer, neighbourhood, or project.
