Ottawa, ON — The total value of building permits in Canada declined 1.5 per cent in June to $11.9 billion, reports Statistics Canada. The decline was primarily due to the non-residential sector, which after posting its second-highest monthly value last month, dropped 10.4 per cent to $3.7 billion in June. This was primarily due to decreases in British Columbia’s commercial and institutional components.
With declines in eight provinces, commercial permit values decreased 2.7 per cent. However, despite declines in eight provinces, Ontario saw an increase of 37.5 per cent.
Additionally, following strong growth in May, intentions in the institutional component fell 32.2 per cent. Conversely, the value of industrial permits rose 0.6 per cent, thanks to Saskatchewan, which increased by 206 per cent.
Following a strong first quarter in 2022, the second quarter saw the non-residential sector decrease by 5.1 per cent.
Thanks to large gains in Ontario (up 24.8 per cent), the value of multi-family building permits increased 6.5 per cent. However, the construction intentions in the single-family home component declined 0.6 per cent, due to significant decreases in Manitoba and Newfoundland and Labrador. Ontario did show gains (up 2.1 per cent) which helped counter the losses.
The overall value of residential permits increased 3.1 per cent to $8.2 billion nationally in June. Additionally, in the second quarter of 2022, the total value of building permits increased 2.8 per cent from the previous quarter to $35.9 billion.