Housing affordability in Canada, 2024

In 2024, 23.2% of Canadian households lived in housing unaffordable to them defined as spending 30% or more of their income on shelter costs up from 22.0% in 2022. Renters (33.7%) were more likely than owners (17.4%) to live in unaffordable housing. This gap has been stable since 2018, the first cycle of this survey.

Our take: Renter affordability collapse is now a 33.7% problem — a structural gift to cap rate compression and rent growth justification, but it also signals regulatory pressure on rent controls and tenant protections that could crimp future upside.

In your underwriting: Build 50–100 bps rent growth buffer into 5-year proforma, but stress-test DSCR against imminent policy responses (rent freeze talk, tenant advocate momentum) that could cap NOI expansion despite demand tailwinds.

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