‘Colossally high’ number of Canadians plan to buy a home within a year. Why?

Nearly 50 per cent of Canadians say they plan to purchase a home in the next five years and 11 per cent within the next 12 months, a new poll shows.

With Canada’s housing market “starting to turn a corner,” there is growing demand for homeownership with a “colossally high” number of people planning to buy a home within the next year, according to a new poll.

Almost half (49 per cent) of the people surveyed by NerdWallet last month said that they plan to purchase a home in the next five years. That percentage is up from a year ago when 43 per cent expressed the same intent.

Over the next 12 months, about one in 10 (11 per cent) or 4.4 million Canadians plan to buy a home, which is a still a “colossally high number” given that the greatest number of homes sold in a single year was less than 700,000, said Clay Jarvis, NerdWallet’s mortgage and real estate expert in Canada, in a report Wednesday analyzing the survey results.

“People are actually even more eager to own their own homes despite high interest rates, despite low supply,” Jarvis told Global News in an interview Thursday.

The survey of 1,015 Canadian adults was conducted online by The Harris Poll, Jan. 17-19, 2024. The poll did not specify whether  was prospective first-time homebuyers or current homeowners who were surveyed.

Concerns about job losses, inflation and recession don’t seem to be really impacting Canadians’ desire to own their own homes, Jarvis said.

“People aren’t really focused on macro and economic factors, but when it comes to things like prices and especially interest rates, that’s usually what triggers demand, he added.

Home sales over the last two months are pointing towards “signs of recovery,” according to the Canadian Real Estate Association.