It's been a wild couple of years for real estate markets in Canada, but no part of the country has seen as many complete flip-flops as southern Ontario, where urban expats continue to drive up home prices within an increasingly-large radius of downtown Toronto.

One might think that all of the work-from-home employees who left their micro condos for spacious country abodes would have done so by now, nearly two years into the pandemic, but demand continues to skyrocket for homes in some small towns around the province — more so lately even, it seems, than during the original COVID exodus.

Bancroft, Ontario, a mining town of just 3,881 per the 2016 census, is the latest locale to see gangbuster gains on property values, and I'm not just talking about increases as compared to before the pandy, but rather gains on previously-recorded gains from over the past 12 months.

Gains on gains on gains in Bancroft, is what analysts are reporting, with another new record for home prices set in October of 2021.

"A swift change in lifestyle at the beginning of 2020 was the gateway to a real estate surge across the country, with demand spiking for smaller cities and townships in Ontario," reads a report from RE/MAX published last week.

"The Town of Bancroft experienced this in full, as seen in March 2021 when a new monthly sales record was set. This trend continued for the better part of 2021, however unit sales have begun to slow, slightly."

Slowing sales have been linked to fast-rising prices in Toronto — could this be the case in Bancroft too? Or is there simply not enough inventory to satisfy demand in the town roughly two hours and 45 minutes northeast of us?

"October 2021 set a new record for the lowest number of active residential listings for the month of October since the 1980s, with just 58 units on the market at the end of the month," writes RE/MAX of Bancroft.

"As is the case in so many real estate markets from coast to coast, supply levels are struggling to keep up with the fierce demand for homes."

Of course, as realtors note, the real story in Bancroft right now is the average price of homes being sold — the MLS Home Price Index composite/single-family benchmark price is now sitting at $470,800, up an incredible 48.3 per cent over the same time in 2020.

"Similarly, the average price of all homes sold in October 2021 increased 33.9 per cent year-over-year," notes RE/MAX. "The average price of a home sold during the month was $574,563."

While it's hard to say what the future holds, RE/MAX realtors say the market should moderate slightly in Bancroft, but we've all heard that before about Toronto and this bubble just keeps on growing.