Families in Brantford now need to allocate 70.1 per cent of their median after-tax household income to cover the monthly mortgage payment on a typical home, according to a new report released by the Fraser Institute.
The study, Home Ownership and Rent Affordability in Canadian CMAs, 2014-2023, examined housing affordability across Ontario’s 14 largest urban centres and found that none of them currently offer a sustainable balance between household income and the cost of owning a home.
Brantford’s affordability strain places the city ahead of markets such as London (61.8%), Windsor (63.2%) and Belleville–Quinte West (58.4%), and closer to historically higher-priced regions including Hamilton (76.9%) and Kitchener–Cambridge–Waterloo (73.9%).
The report notes that affordability has deteriorated sharply over the past decade. In 2014, the share of median after-tax family income needed for a mortgage on a typical home ranged from 21.1 per cent in Windsor to 56 per cent in Toronto.
“There is a perception that housing outside the Greater Toronto Area remains affordable, but that’s no longer true,” said Austin Thompson, senior policy analyst with the Fraser Institute and co-author of the report.
According to the findings, soaring house prices combined with largely stagnant wages have intensified the financial pressure on families.
Steven Globerman, Fraser Institute senior fellow and study co-author, added that the province’s affordability crisis “is a direct result of the widening gap between home prices and incomes.”
Policymakers, he said, should prioritize raising wages and household incomes as part of any long-term solution.
Among the 14 metropolitan areas analyzed, Toronto remains the least affordable market, with mortgage payments representing 110.2 per cent of the local median after-tax family income.
Ottawa–Gatineau is the most affordable on the list, though still above the 50-per-cent threshold often cited by economists as a marker of financial strain.
The study notes that data was not available for Thunder Bay and Greater Sudbury.
