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On the rise in Hamilton: housing prices & unemployment

A new report on Hamilton's economy shows that Hamilton's unemployment rate is up almost a full percent from this time last year. Simultaneously, the rise in house prices have outstripped Toronto's real estate growth, again by 1%.

Unemployment is up in Hamilton since a year ago. Meanwhile, the rise of housing prices outstrips Toronto

CBC News ·
Local housing prices have risen at a faster rate than Toronto's, and at the same time, unemployment in the city has grown (Sean Kilpatrick/Canadian Press)

Over the past year, Hamilton has employed fewer people while the cost of its housing has increased faster than in Toronto.

A new report from Workforce Planning Hamilton says, as of last month, 5,800 fewer people were working in Hamilton than in June 2015. That's an increase from 5.3% to 6% unemployed. Unemployment in Ontario and Canada has gone up overall in the same time, but not by almost a full percent.

Meanwhile, housing prices here have between June 2015 and '16 have expanded 13.8%. That's a faster growth than Toronto's notoriously expensive homes, whose prices grew by 12.8%.

Comparing these numbers to Vancouver, which has become the poster child for the real estate bubble: that city's growth rate is 23.4%, or roughly a 2% rise in house prices every month.

These house price growth numbers all come from the National Composite House Price Index by Teranet--National Bank. The same index reports Hamilton housing prices rose by 2.4% in June alone, which is just ahead of the national index of 2.3%.

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