Good article on recent canadian housing numbers
quote from Larry MacDonaldThe problem with using average prices in the housing market is the failure to compare apples with apples and oranges with oranges. In each period, the average price is calculated from a different mix of houses. There will be differences in the proportion of houses by dwelling space, style, number of bedrooms, lot size, region, and a variety of other characteristics.
In particular, when there are a higher number of sales from regions with more expensive homes, the CREA index will signal an increase in price simply due to this shift in the mix of houses. This, indeed, is what has happened in recent months: sales in high-priced cities such as Calgary and Vancouver are rising more quickly than elsewhere and distorting the CREA index. http://ca.finance.yahoo.com/personal-finance/article/canadianbusiness/1143/wanted-better-house-price-indexes