A week ago Toronto’s spring housing market was poised to be a sizzler with more buyers than listings. By Monday, real estate executives were reporting mixed results from weekend open houses, some of which continued to be brisk and others that stood empty.

The Toronto Regional Real Estate Board hasn’t yet issued a revised forecast from its initial prediction of 10 per cent price growth this year and it will be a couple of weeks before there’s a clearer picture of what’s ahead, said Jason Mercer, director of market analysis.

He notes that the COVID-19 shutdown really only took hold the end of last week. But that comes in a short period in which there has been two rare interest rate cuts since March 4.

“What you’re going to see is essentially potential homebuyers and sellers weighing very low borrowing costs with the potential to go lower, against the economic and health impacts of COVID-19,” he said.

Royal LePage CEO Phil Soper said the extraordinary 100-basis-point drop in only a few days divides the housing market into two camps.

The first is those who are delaying plans to buy or list in favour of the social distancing being urged by health authorities.

But there is another group “who are encouraged by the sudden improvement in affordability,” Soper said. “People who have been desperate to secure housing felt this was too important to pass up.”

Right at Home Realty president John Lusink said the virus might very well win out over the lure of lower interest rates.

“If you can’t get out to see a house I don’t care if the interest rates are negative,” he said. “I’m not sure how agents are going to be able to do their jobs.”

On Monday, Right At Home’s weekly report showed listings were up 7.5 per cent last week compared to the previous week but still down four per cent compared to last year for the same period.

Incoming or pending sales were up 11 per cent and closing transactions increased 14 per cent.

But anecdotally, showings were way down and Lusink said next week will show a very different picture.

“By the end of the week I’d be surprised if you saw anything over zero showings, which would then translate into a 50 to 70 per cent drop in incoming transactions. I think we will definitely see an impact but with everything that’s coming out from government and industry, it will take a few days,” he said.

Saturday was the first time Royal LePage agent Chanel Uguccioni said she could recall an open house attracting only a single visitor.

She said there were no visitors to the 2,000-square-foot family home she opened near Danforth Avenue, until the end when she went to retrieve her signs. At that point a woman carrying hand sanitizer came through for a tour, keeping a safe social distance.

“It’s unfortunate seeing everything come to a pause,” Uguccioni said.

Given a choice, she said she won’t do open houses this weekend. But the reality is, real estate agents don’t have a choice if a seller wants to open their doors.

“We’re at our clients’ beck and call. We have to be out there,” she said.

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Realosophy president John Pasalis said he heard a different story from agents on the weekend. Some were dealing with competitive and bully offers.

“A lot of people who are serious buyers still want to buy a house. If they have their down payment, they have their jobs, they’re not concerned,” he said.

“We forget how out of whack the housing market was. Literally 50 per cent of buyers could walk away from the market and it would still be a competitive market,” Pasalis said.

But he thinks that was the final push.

Services that support the real estate industry are also closing down. A stager who was supposed to work on a listing this week cancelled.

“Once stagers and photographers start cancelling how are we going to list a home,” Pasalis said.

“Once people start quarantining more, I think you might get more sellers saying, ‘I don’t want strangers in my home right now,’” he said.

Re/max regional director Christopher Alexander said his company can’t force agents to stop holding open houses.

“But we’re strongly encouraging them to suspend open houses until school comes back,” he said.

Meantime, he said there’s a surge in the use of virtual selling tools.

That is being used by agents in some European countries where the industry has been completely shut down or in places such as Austria where there is a fine for holding an open house amid the COVID-19 outbreak, Alexander said.