Mortgage Payments & qualifying income requirements have shifted across 13 major markets from 2022–2025.

By Gazette Staff

December 2^nd, 2025

BURLINGTON, ON

Canada’s housing market has seen significant affordability challenges since the pandemic, but new data shows a surprising shift: some of the country’s most expensive cities are now seeing improvements in the cost of home ownership.

A new joint report from leading real estate platform Wahi and Perch, a top digital mortgage platform, tracks how changes in mortgage payments and qualifying income requirements have shifted across 13 major markets from 2022–2025.

Ownership costs have dropped significantly in Toronto and Hamilton, while more affordable regions, like Quebec City and Calgary, are seeing the steepest increases.

Key insights from the report:

• Where costs dropped: Toronto and Hamilton saw more than 10% declines in monthly mortgage payments and qualifying income on 25-year mortgage amortization terms, the only markets with outright decreases.
• Where costs surged: Quebec City led the country with mortgage payments and required incomes up ~ 40%; Calgary also saw affordability erode as house prices in these cities climbed.
• Impact of 30-year amortizations, which were introduced in 2024 for first-time buyers and buyers of newly built homes:
• Six markets saw reduced qualifying incomes or monthly payments (including Toronto, Hamilton, Montreal, Ottawa, Victoria, and Vancouver).
• When looking at longer amortizations combined with lower Ontario home prices, home ownership costs in Toronto and Hamilton decreased by 20–25%.
• Nationally, 30-year terms lowered average monthly payments by 11% and required incomes by 3%, compared to 2022.
• Affordability outlook: When changes to local incomes are taken into account (where a typical household is closer to the required income to buy), affordability improves at the national level as well as in seven markets between 2022 and 2025.