Did you know?

$230,134

The average price of a home in
September 2000

$938,334

The average price of a home in
September 2025

By now, most Canadians are intimately familiar with just how unaffordable housing has become, but how quickly did things actually go out of control?

How Quickly Has the Average Monthly Mortgage Payment Increased?

Mortgage prices have skyrocketed since 2020, with the pandemic triggering an unprecedented surge in housing costs. The average Canadian income of approximately $60,000–$70,000/year is now insufficient across most of Canada. In many provinces, even households earning significantly above the national average are spending 40–50%+ of their income on mortgage payments—well beyond the 30% affordability threshold.

$75,000
$30K $250K
2024
2012 2024

Scale

Very Affordable (<20%)
Affordable (20-30%)
Borderline (30-40%)
Unaffordable (40-50%)
Very Unaffordable (>50%)
No Data

Based on mortgage payment as % of monthly income

National Average

$2,006

Most Affordable

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Least Affordable

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How Quickly Has Rent Increased?

The rental market hasn't fared any better, with rent in many cities only steadily decreasing in the 2010's to noticeably climbing across unit types in the past five years. Thus we begin to explore: what factors have led to the current housing crisis?

How has the share of income spent on rent changed in the last 20 years?

In Canadian cities, the price of rent has gone up significantly over the past two decades, with income struggling to keep up. The average single Canadian was spending 43% of their income on rent in 2023 as opposed to only 36.5% in 2000. In fact, we can see that even the share of income spent on rent for the family type with the most income - dual parent families - is steadily increaing in the Post -COVID era, indicating that rent increases are outpacing income increases across the board.

How Has Rent Responded to Population Changes?

Overall, most years and locations in which there is a high percentage increase in rent also see a corresponding increase in population. There are of course exceptions, such as PEI in 2023 which saw a mere 0.93% increase in average rent despite a 4.52% increase in population, or Ontario in 2022 which saw a 7% increase in average rent with only a 0.27% increase in population. However, positive correlation between population and average rent increases suggests that supply is struggling to keep up with demand, driving up prices.

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How Tight Are Vacancy Rates in Major Cities?

Looking at the vacancy rates of major cities, it can be seen that the cities have low vacancy rates, which when combined with the knowledge that population has been exploding over the past few years suggests even further that supply has not been able to keep up with demand.

2023
2000 2023
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Does Housing Construction Keep Up With Population Growth?

At the root of housing issues lies the rate of construction of housing units across Canada. In comparison to the sharp increase in population that Canada has seen in the past five years, housing completions have remained stagnant leading to overhwhelming demand over supply. This is reflected in the ratio between new people and new homes, seen with Alberta in 2023 having 1 new home for every 21 new people.

In conclusion, the current housing crisis can be seen as a crisis of the government failing Canadians. Construction of housing has failed to keep up with increases in population, which has driven up prices nationwide. Meanwhile, wages have increased at a much slower rate, making housing unnaffordable for an increasing amount of Canadians. In order to stem this crisis, the Canadian government needs to increase housing supply or limit the rate at which the population grows, and should aid in ensuring that wages and housing prices change at proportional rates.