The number of houses being built in Canada has just surged in the largest jump since 2017 . 

On Tuesday, the Canadian Mortgage and Housing Corp (CMHC) said that builders began work on an annualized 245,604 units in July. This is a 16 per cent increase from the previous month in which builders worked on 212,095 units. 

According to CMHC,  what really drove the national increase was higher, multi-family starts in urban areas like Vancouver and Toronto as well as oil-producing centres in the Prairies. 

The national trend in #housingstarts went up for a second straight month. Despite the increase in June and July, we expect a lower trend in the near term due to the negative impact of #COVID19 on economic and #housing indicators: https://t.co/o4QVF7VWsP pic.twitter.com/ONaeiUYjbg

— CMHC (@CMHC_ca) August 11, 2020

This increase, however, is not expected to last long due to continued the spread of COVID-19. 

"Following declines in previous months from COVID-19 measures, higher activity in June and July leaves the trend in housing starts in line with the long-run average level of housing starts," said Bob Dungan, CMHC's chief economist in a statement.

"We expect national starts to trend lower in the near term as a result of the negative impact of COVID-19 on economic and housing indicators."

Royce Mendes of CIBC Economics shared a similar sentiment in a note to clients. 

"Despite the housing market's durability thus far, we continue to see a soft spot ahead given the ongoing lack of immigration and upcoming resumption of many deferred mortgages."

Besides this, urban starts of apartments, condos, and other multiple-housing projects rose 18 per cent in July as single-detached urban starts rose rose 12.3 per cent.