Canada Housing Starts Drop in July Even as Home Sales Continue to Rise

OTTAWA—Canadian housing starts continued to fall last month, with fewer new projects kicking off in Toronto and other big cities despite a rise in completions and signs of life in the resale market.

Housing starts across Canada came in at a seasonally adjusted annualized rate of 229,074 units, a 4.9% decline from the month before, Canada Mortgage and Housing Corp. said Tuesday. The market was expecting about 250,000 residential housing projects to have started during the month, following a 5.6% drop in June, according to economists at TD Securities.