Recent immigrants in Canada more likely to buy homes by year five
A StatsCan study finds homeownership for recent immigrants rose to 40% in Ontario, though they carry larger mortgages.
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Recent immigrants to Canada are increasingly becoming homeowners within five years of arrival, though they remain less likely to own property than Canadian-born citizens, according to a Statistics Canada study released Tuesday.
In Ontario, homeownership among recent immigrants in their fifth year in Canada rose from 35.7 per cent in 2018 to 40.2 per cent in 2021 — an increase of over 12 per cent. Over the same period, Canadian-born individuals saw a five per cent decrease in homeownership, dropping from 50.7 per cent to 47.8 per cent.
Recent immigrants held the highest homeownership rates in the Maritimes and Manitoba, where they matched Canadian-born ownership levels.
"As they spend more time in Canada, recent immigrants are more likely to own residential properties in Canada," said Samuel MacIsaac, senior research analyst at Statistics Canada's Centre for Housing and Income Statistics. "While immigrants remain less likely to be homeowners than the average Canadian-born person by their fifth year as immigrants, that gap in ownership reduces substantially."
More than 85 per cent of recent immigrants who owned a home in their first year had already lived in Canada as non-permanent residents on work or study permits or asylum claims before being admitted as permanent residents. At least one in ten refugees became homeowners after five years, including nearly one in five in Ontario.
Recent immigrants prioritized property acquisition over registered retirement savings. They purchased more expensive homes than Canadian-born first-time homebuyers while earning lower incomes, and were less likely to contribute to an RRSP. Those who became homeowners under age 35 carried larger monthly mortgages from 2018 to 2021 than Canadian-born households.
Homeownership patterns varied by region of birth. South Asian immigrants in their fifth year held homeownership rates of 46 per cent in British Columbia and 53.8 per cent in Ontario. Southeast Asian immigrants ranged from 23.3 per cent in Ontario to 59.9 per cent in New Brunswick. Permanent residents from East Asia were most likely to become homeowners in Ontario, Alberta, and British Columbia.