Bridle Path residents -- and all Toronto home-owners -- can party like it's 1989.

The $5.5-million purchase of a house in the exclusive Toronto neighbourhood by a holding company possibly linked to pop star Prince -- has rekindled memories of the late 1980s housing boom.

"We're expecting about 7,000 home sales in March," said Toronto Real Estate Board president David Pearce.

House prices in Toronto this month are expected to equal the previous high-water mark of 1989, he said.

Prices are expected to average $287,000 but the million-dollar home sales are few and far between.

Pearce said there may be one or two that exceed a $2-million price tag this month and in the last 12 months seven on the Bridle Path have sold at an average price of $2.8 million.

MARRIED TORONTO GIRL?

In October, Gamillah Holdings bought the Bridle Path home. The president of the company is Manuela Testolini, a 25-year-old Torontonian, who is rumoured to have married Prince in a ceremony in Hawaii on New Year's Eve.

Gamillah is the title of a song by the 43-year-old pop star.

The possibility of having Prince as a neighbour, doesn't make much difference to residents of the exclusive neighbourhood in the Bayview and Lawrence Aves. area.

At least two had never even heard of His Purpleness who has, in the past, been known by a symbol and referred to as The Artist Formerly Known As Prince.

The highest price ever recorded for a Bridle Path neighbourhood home is $7.55 million for a house on High Point Rd. in 2000.

-- With files from Jack Boland