The Dynamics of Housing Affordability
CMHC have published a joint study with StatsCan on the dynamics of housing affordability, 2002 to 2004. Affordable housing is defined as paying more than 30% of household pre tax income on shelter costs. Annually published cross sectional estimates show that about 20% of Canadians were paying too much for housing in any given year over this period. This new study adds to our knowledge by showing that 28% of households exceeded the affordabiliity limit at least once over the 3 years, rising to 62% of those in the bottom one fifth of households ranked by income. About one third of the bottom 40% of households were persistently paying too much for housing, exceeding the 30% threshold in every year.