Chart Storm: Five graphs on the great Canadian homeownership gap

The annual income required for a mortgage can be more than double the average annual income in some provinces

Homeownership increasingly resembles a distant dream rather than an achievable milestone for Millennial and Gen Z Canadians. The barrier to homeownership is high and only moving higher, as the required annual income to get a mortgage in nearly every province lies firmly ahead of the provincial and national average.

In British Columbia, for instance, a prospective homeowner would need to earn approximately $180,000 to afford a typical home, yet the average annual income in the province sits closer to $62,000. That’s a gap of nearly three times. Ontario follows a similar trend, where just over $150,000 of income is needed to qualify for a home purchase, but average incomes hover around $61,000: a shortfall of about 2.5 times.

The only province in Canada where the income needed for a mortgage is within $25,000 of the average income is Newfoundland and Labrador, where there is only about a $5,600 difference.

Since mortgage eligibility is tied to stress-tested income thresholds, these disparities are inconvenient to navigate and, oftentimes, disqualifying.

Even some above-average earners have to save for over a decade to afford a down payment

A Canadian earning over $100,000 annually falls into the top 20 percent of income earners nationally, yet in cities like Vancouver and Toronto, they must save for over 15 years to accumulate a 20 percent down payment.

These numbers are even more troubling because they represent ideal scenarios: they assume stable employment, zero major financial shocks or economic crises, and no dependents. However, high-income earners in expensive cities often face higher living costs, particularly rent, which constrains their ability to save the assumed $14,000 annually. If that savings rate drops to 10 percent or $7,000 a year, the timeline in Vancouver extends to nearly 35 years. Factor in average annual home price appreciation of just 6 percent, and the down payment requirement itself would grow much faster than a saver’s ability to catch up, making the goal more elusive as years go by.

Home prices remain unaffordable, with no sign of prices dropping

Home prices in May 2025 stand anywhere from six times to 21 times higher than the provincial average yearly salaries in Canada’s largest cities.

In 2000, the national average for a home price was three times more than the average annual salary; in 2010, it was five times more and in 2020, it was seven times more.

When asked whether he thinks housing prices need to come down, Canada’s new Housing and Infrastructure Minister Gregor Robertson says he doesn’t think so, and that the federal government should focus on building more homes rather than bringing the prices of existing ones down.

“No. I think that we need to deliver more supply, make sure the market is stable. It’s a huge part of our economy,” said Robertson. “We need to be delivering more affordable housing. The Government of Canada has not been building affordable housing since the nineties, and we created a huge shortage across Canada. That’s where the big need is right now.”

Robertson was the mayor of Vancouver from 2008 to 2018. In that timeframe, housing prices in Vancouver increased by about 179 percent: from $899,367 in January 2008 to $2,507,229 in January 2018.

Maintaining high home prices boosts homeowner wealth, but sinks renters’

If Minister Robertson maintains his plan not to reduce the cost of housing directly, but to have the government build more affordable housing, there is a likelihood that the net worth disparity between homeowners and renters will hold or widen.

Home ownership remains a primary source of wealth accumulation for many Canadian families, as real estate equity represents 42 percent of overall household wealth in 2023.

For Canadians under 35, the median net worth of homeowners is 938.9 percent higher than that of renters in the same age group, nearly 10 times more. The gap is even wider for Canadians between the ages of 55 and 64: 2788 percent, or nearly 30 times more. For seniors, the disparity is 1401 percent, about 14 times more.

A majority of young Canadians are hopeless about housing

Arguably, those hardest hit by the generational ownership gap are Millennials and Gen Zers. These young Canadians, entering or already in the workforce, are looking to begin their lives independently and get ahead. Their incomes tend to be lower, and they typically have less savings than older Canadians, which makes applying for and qualifying for a mortgage all the more difficult. They want to start families, but find themselves delaying marriage and waiting to have kids because of the inaccessibility of homeownership in Canada.

Consequently, a majority of both Millennial and Gen Z Canadians believe that buying a home is unattainable; simply not in the cards for them.

However, many young Canadians have some hope. About 60 percent of Canadians aged 18 to 43 are still determined to purchase a home within the next five years, despite the roadblocks ahead of them on the path to homeownership.