Investor Share of Home Purchases in Canada: How Much Housing Investors Buy and Own

How much of the housing market do investors account for? The Bank of Canada and Statistics Canada measure it in two ways: the share of home purchases made by investors, and the share of the existing housing stock that investors own. This page sets out both, by city, province and property type, along with who the investors are, how they affect prices and rents, and the policies aimed at them. It is part of our housing market analysis.

Statistics Canada defines an investor as an owner of at least one residential property that is not their primary residence. That takes in landlords with one rental condo, owners of a cottage, people who own a home in a province where they don’t live, non-resident owners and businesses.

The investor share of home purchases

The Bank of Canada sorts mortgaged home purchases into first-time buyers, repeat buyers and investors. In a note published in January 2022, it found investors had accounted for 19% of mortgaged home purchases since 2014, ranging from 14% in Winnipeg to 21% in Toronto over the same period. Because the data covers only mortgages from Canadian financial institutions, it captures mostly domestic buyers and leaves out cash purchases (Bank of Canada).

Statistics Canada’s count from property records, which includes buyers who paid cash, covers three provinces in 2018 to 2020:

Source: Statistics Canada, Investors among residential real estate buyers, Canadian Housing Statistics Program.

Investors made up a larger share of condominium apartment buyers than of single-detached house buyers: in Halifax, Vancouver and Victoria, they made up around one-third of condominium apartment buyers.

The investor share of the housing stock

Ownership of the existing stock moves more slowly than purchases. In 2020, the share of owners who were investors ranged from 20.2% in Ontario to 31.5% in Nova Scotia, and just under one in five houses and condos was used as an investment across British Columbia, Manitoba, Ontario, New Brunswick and Nova Scotia combined. Condos are where investors concentrate: in Ontario, 41.9% of condominium apartments were investment properties (Statistics Canada).

Measured by value, 29.5% of the assessed value of Nova Scotia’s residential property was in investment properties in 2022, the highest of the six provinces Statistics Canada studied.

Who the investors are

In every province studied except Nova Scotia, individuals with up to five properties owned the largest share of investment property by value, ahead of businesses and institutional investors. Statistics Canada’s 2022 data splits investors by size:

Source: Statistics Canada, Individual and institutional investors in the Canadian housing market. Provinces studied: PEI, Nova Scotia, New Brunswick, Ontario, Manitoba and British Columbia.

Institutional investors (real estate investment trusts, pension funds and large private owners) are more likely to own purpose-built rental buildings, with dozens or hundreds of units, than single homes. In Ontario and British Columbia, Statistics Canada attributes small individual investors’ large share of rental value to the big stock of condos, which are easier to buy one at a time. Among investor buyers in 2018 to 2020, around one-third owned three or more properties.

Effect on prices and rents

Investors affect the market from both sides:

• Demand. Investor buyers compete with first-time and repeat buyers for the same homes, especially condos, which adds to price pressure when many are buying at once. How that competition shapes younger buyers’ chances is covered in the generational homeownership gap.
• Rental supply. Investment properties that are rented out add to the rental stock, and Statistics Canada notes that investors provide much of the capital for new construction. A home bought by an investor and rented stays in the rental market; one sold by an investor to an owner-occupier leaves it. Current rents are tracked in the rentals hub.
• Credit. Investors who borrow against existing homes to buy more add to household mortgage debt; how much Canadians owe is in Canadian mortgage debt statistics.

The net effect depends on the local market: whether investors are adding rental units in a tight rental market, or bidding against owner-occupiers in a market with few listings.

Foreign vs domestic investors

Statistics Canada’s investor counts include non-resident owners, but houses used as an investment were mainly owned by individuals living in the same province as the property. Since 2023, most non-Canadians have been barred from buying residential property; the rules, exceptions and expiry date are in the foreign buyer ban.

Investor economics

Whether a rental property pays depends on the rent against the mortgage payment, condo fees, property tax, insurance and vacancy, and on the down payment and qualifying rules for rental mortgages, which are stricter than for a home you live in. The investment properties hub covers the numbers, starting with rental property mortgages.

Policy responses

Governments have aimed several measures at investor and speculative demand:

• the federal ban on most foreign buyers, linked above;
• the federal residential property flipping rule, under which a gain on a home sold within 365 days of buying it is generally taxed as business income, with exceptions for certain life events (house flipping taxes);
• the federal Underused Housing Tax, which applied to vacant or underused homes owned by some non-Canadians and has since ended for current years;
• provincial and municipal vacancy taxes, such as BC’s speculation and vacancy tax and Toronto’s vacant home tax (vacant home taxes across Canada).

Related pages

• The generational homeownership gap
• Canadian mortgage debt statistics
• Is Canada in a housing bubble?
• Capital gains tax on investment property