Cold weather saw the Kitchener-Waterloo housing market heat up in February, although it continued to lag behind its pace of the last several years.

According to the Kitchener-Waterloo Association of Realtors, 423 residential properties changed hands last month.

While that number is up from the 219 homes sold during January, it’s down from the 436 sold in February 2014 – and in fact the slowest February for home sales in the region since 2009.

“With the recent announcement that the Bank of Canada will be holding interest rates at 0.75 per cent, we should continue to see a steady, stable market for Kitchener-Waterloo,” KWAR president Mark Wolle said in a news release.

The bulk of the homes sold in Kitchener, Waterloo, Wellesley, Wilmot and Woolwich were single detached homes.

The average selling price for those 250 homes was $395,285 – a 1.2 per cent increase over February 2014.

Condo prices were up 0.4 per cent over the previous February, while townhouse prices rose 6.8 per cent and semi-detached prices 3.6 per cent.