GTA home sales fall 7.9% to 5,603 in October

Home sales in the Greater Toronto Area (GTA) fell 7.9% to 5,603 in October from a year earlier, the Toronto Regional Real Estate Board (TRREB) said. TRREB said uncertainty about inflation, borrowing costs and the economy kept many buyers on the sidelines. Yet monthly mortgage payments remain far lower than in 2023 and 2024, it said.

Global News reported that new listings fell 11.9% to 14,173, faster than sales. By type, townhouse sales fell 11% and condo sales 10.4%, the two steepest drops among housing types.

The average selling price fell 2.7% from a year earlier to $1,024,108. TRREB’s MLS Home Price Index composite benchmark, a separate measure, fell 4.3%, faster than the average. But on a seasonally adjusted basis, October sales and new listings rose from September.

On that uncertainty, TRREB president Daniel Steinfeld said a Canada-U.S. trade deal could give GTA residents a clearer picture of the economic outlook. Looking ahead, BNN Bloomberg reported that Jason Mercer, TRREB’s chief information officer, expects the usual seasonal slowdown in November and December.

Borrowing costs, one of the worries TRREB named, rose on October 28, when the Bank of Canada raised its benchmark rate by a quarter of a percentage point to 2.5%, its first increase since July 2023. The bank said it expects housing to remain relatively weak. For condos, TD Economics forecast that prices may not trend higher in earnest until 2028, leaving the correction close to six years long. The Bank of Canada’s next scheduled rate announcement is December 9.

Sources: Global News · Toronto Regional Real Estate Board (TRREB) · BNN Bloomberg · Bank of Canada · TD Economics

Home sales fell as borrowing costs rose: the Bank of Canada’s policy rate is now 2.50%, up 0.25 points from a year earlier.

Policy rate: 2.50% on November 3, 2026, up 0.25 points from 2.25% on November 3, 2025.

Source: Bank of Canada

Toronto's Ada merges with Dialpad at reported $600 million value

Ada, a Toronto customer-service technology company, is merging with California’s Dialpad, the companies said on November 4. Dialpad, around since 2011, sells communications, contact-centre and sales engagement software to businesses. The companies did not disclose financial terms, but BetaKit, citing The Globe and Mail, reported that the all-share deal values Ada at about $600 million. That is a fraction of the US$1.2 billion Ada was worth when it closed its Series C round in 2021.

Ada competes against better-funded rivals such as Decagon and Sierra. It is not alone: many other Canadian tech firms that raised money at sky-high valuations are also struggling to grow into them.

The deal is expected to close on or about November 12. After that, Dialpad’s Craig Walker will be chief executive of the combined company, and Ada’s Mike Murchison Chief AI Officer.

For context, a Council of Canadian Innovators study found that leadership and decision-making moved abroad in 93% of cases after foreign acquisitions. As Toronto Ledger reported on October 24, Toronto’s Ribbon also agreed to a takeover.

Sources: Dialpad · BetaKit

Canadian Tire puts $200 million into larger Mark's stores

BNN Bloomberg reported that Canadian Tire, which owns the apparel retailer Mark’s, will spend $200 million opening and refreshing stores. Larger Mark’s stores drove double-digit increases in sales per square foot, which Mark’s president PJ Czank had initially feared would fall.

The new format uses larger stores of roughly 25,000 square feet. Canadian Tire tested the concept in five former Bed Bath & Beyond locations. So far 21 stores in five provinces, including Ontario, use it, and the goal is at least 40 of Mark’s expected 387 stores by the end of 2028.

Mr Czank said the aim of the format is to draw women who do not usually shop at Mark’s, and younger customers. But he said it is not really suitable for downtown Toronto or Vancouver, where space is at a premium, though it works in metropolitan and suburban regions.

For context, Statistics Canada said sales at clothing retailers, a category that includes Mark’s, were about $3.2 billion in July 2026, up 5.5% from a year earlier, against 5.1% for all retail.

Mr Czank said the concept is “a scratching of the surface.”

Sources: BNN Bloomberg · Statistics Canada · Canadian Tire Corporation

Kindergarten readiness predicts Ontario pupils' math through Grade 9

The University of Toronto said research from its Ontario Institute for Studies in Education found kindergarten readiness can predict math achievement as late as Grade 9. The question was how far readiness reaches, and which kind matters most.

Ontario kindergarten teachers fill out the Early Development Instrument (EDI), a measure of school readiness, for each child roughly every three years. Researchers linked those results for more than 25,000 children to math assessments in Grades 3, 6 and 9.

The strongest and most consistent predictor was language and cognitive readiness. Less ready children tended to score lower from Grade 3, and the gaps largely persisted into Grade 9. Lead author Fatemeh Ameli said, though, that early readiness predicts later achievement but does not determine a child’s future.

Yahoo Canada reported that most variation in math achievement lies among individual students, not schools or boards. Ontario’s full-day kindergarten, introduced more than a decade ago, was designed partly to give all children more time to build early skills; the authors say their results support universal early investment.

Sources: University of Toronto · Yahoo Canada · McMaster University · OISE, University of Toronto

Developer asks to raise 550 Adelaide East to 37 storeys

UrbanToronto reported that AWIN Group of Dealerships, a group of car dealerships, is asking the Committee of Adjustment to raise its 550 Adelaide East tower from 29 to 37 storeys. The change would add eight floors and 24.75 metres, taking the tower to 123 metres. It would also add 63 homes, for 303 in all, though tenure is now unspecified.

The site lies about 150 metres north of the Distillery District station, now under construction on Ontario Line 3. That places it within the Corktown Protected Major Transit Station Area. The request follows an earlier rezoning: council endorsed it with conditions in July 2023, and the site-specific by-law was enacted that December.

The revision keeps the approved podium and tower footprints, but vehicle parking would grow from 100 to 138 spaces. A street-level car dealership would also stay at Adelaide and Berkeley streets. A Site Plan application for the project is still under review.

Map: 550 Adelaide Street East, Toronto. © OpenStreetMap contributors

Sources: UrbanToronto

5,603 homes changed hands in the Greater Toronto Area in October 2026, down 7.9% from October 2025, the Toronto Regional Real Estate Board (TRREB) said. Adjusted for the season, sales rose from September.

MLS Home Price Index: TRREB’s benchmark gauge of home prices, separate from the average selling price. Its composite benchmark fell 4.3% year over year in October 2026; the average price fell 2.7% to $1,024,108.

• Thu Nov 12: Ada and Dialpad expect their all-share merger to close.

• Weather: Showers ending early in the morning then mainly cloudy with 30 percent chance of showers. Wind southwest 30 km/h gusting to 50. High 16°C. Overnight low 11°C.

• Daylight: Sunrise 06:58, sunset 17:03; 10 h 5 min, 3 min less than yesterday

• Subway: Line 1 Yonge-University: no service Lawrence West to St Andrew, from 23:59.

• Civic: New council term begins in 10 days (Sunday, November 15)

• TSX: 36,341.40 at the close ▲ 2.28% (The Canadian Press)

• Dollar: 71.63 US cents ▲ 0.24%

• 5-year bond: 3.49% (it steers fixed mortgage rates) ▲ 0.03 (as of Nov 3)

• Gas: 177.9 cents a litre for regular, up 3.4 on the week (as of Nov 2)

Small charts show the last seven readings: trading days for the TSX, the dollar and the bond; weeks for gas.

Cholera reaches York, 1832. Cholera, carried across the Atlantic on emigrant ships, reached York on June 18, 1832. Three days later the town named doctors and laymen to a Board of Health, but it lacked the powers to improve sanitation or ease overcrowding. By September 12, 205 of 535 people with cholera had died. Afterwards York incorporated as the City of Toronto, which let residents take charge of public health: sewers, a city board of health and regular garbage collection.

Sources: Friends of Fort York: Cholera epidemics in York (Toronto) in 1832 and 1834 · Heritage Toronto: Toronto’s epidemic history

A little ill-built town on low land, at the bottom of a frozen bay, with one very ugly church, without tower or steeple

Anna Brownell Jameson, Winter Studies and Summer Rambles in Canada (1838). Irish-born writer and critic (1794-1860), who spent the winter of 1836-37 in Toronto, where her husband was attorney general.

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