If you're not yet sick of headlines about how desperate of a state Toronto's housing market is in, here's one more for you: sales stats for new homes have just hit a historic low. And yeah, it's really low.

The Building Industry and Land Development Association (BILD), which represents stakeholders in the GTA's new home sector, has once again released some pretty dreadful figures that paint a worsening portrait of withering activity in what used to be a perennially lucrative market, especially for investors.

With a staggering 80 per cent of investor-owners in the region now losing money on new units, it's no wonder that the number of newly built condos sold last month was 61 per cent lower than in August 2023, and an even more appalling 81 per cent below the 10-year average for sales.

Adding single-family homes to the equation, these declines were a not-much-better 46 per cent year-over-year and 73 per cent from the 10-year average, up from a 70 per cent drop from the 10-year-average in July.

"GTA New Home Sales Hit Record Lows as Buyers Flee and Inventory Soars."

- New home sales in July down 70% from the 10-year average.

- Condo sales plummet 81% below the decade trend.

- 15 months of inventory piling up as construction grinds to a halt. pic.twitter.com/YnGeWYT2KS

— Shazi (@ShaziGoalie) August 28, 2024

This is also a time of peak inventory levels, which have given buyers more choice and negotiating power — that is, if sellers can find a selection of interested buyers at all, which many are hard-pressed to do unless they are willing to absorb a significant loss.

BILD says the number of active listings was slightly down in August versus July, but still at a whopping  21,296 homes, 80 per cent of them condos.

For developers taking the hit, there are the added woes of exorbitant (and rising) municipal development fees, inflated material and labour costs, and more on top of sales that started falling off a cliff some months ago.

It's leading many to press pause on new projects, though that fortunately hasn't seemed to put a dent in record high supply levels.

I mean, this is how it used to work. https://t.co/x7anGdBQjM

— Mike Lipsius (@mikelipsius) August 7, 2024

As BILD writes in its update this week, "months of inventory are staying high not because the number of new units coming to market is dramatically increasing, but rather because sales are continually decreasing. This is an unhealthy situation, because as interest rates decrease, sales will return but it will take longer for new building to recover, setting up a future supply/demand imbalance."

"August's new home sales data paints a stark picture of a housing market that is struggling with deep structural issues that have made the cost to build too high," it adds, saying that "the crisis is real and will be reflected in the next several years by fewer jobs, fewer new homes and compounded affordability challenges."

Developers and builders have made earlier pleas for the government to reduce the soaring fees on new builds, which have increased 1,200 per cent over 15 years in some parts of Ontario. There is now a Coalition Against New-Home Taxes (CANT), which argues that cuts to certain levies are necessary to help reduce consumer-facing home prices.

Yeah, this will do no such thing. It’s good to see big players fail and allow the market to figure itself out.

— King Richard (@BabylonDon21) August 1, 2024

However, many citizens find it hard to sympathize with the companies that have made a pretty penny off of the region's long-overpriced market, and contributed to it being that way in the first place.