Recent and emerging trends in Canada’s residential mortgage industry

We’ve recently revamped our Residential Mortgage Industry Report. You’ll continue to find highlights from the most recent residential mortgage industry trends — and findings from our research.

The Residential Mortgage Industry Report is published twice a year. It focuses on topics that are relevant for policy and business decisions. Information in this report can lead to enhanced risk-based decisions that will contribute to more stable and affordable housing markets.

Recent trends from the Spring 2022 issue

• In 2021, residential mortgage debt continued to ramp up (+9% compared to the previous year). This is the result of strong activity in the housing market and record-low interest rates.
• Mortgage growth continued to increase (+10%) in the third quarter of 2021 bringing total residential mortgage debt in Canada up to $1.77 trillion.
• Increasing discounts continue to boost borrowers’ interest on variable-rate mortgages.
• Growth in mortgage debt has accelerated as new uninsured mortgages for property purchases and refinances record substantial increases.
• 2021 closed with a higher share of mortgages with a loan-to-value ratio of 65% or less. This is despite an upward trending distribution of loan-to-value ratios of new uninsured mortgages in the first half of the year.
• Mortgages in arrears (delinquent for 90 days or more) continued to trend downward across all lender types.

Emerging and structural trends in the residential mortgage industry

• The majority of alternative mortgages (72%) have had an effective exit strategy in place in 2020. Borrowers were able to get a loan with a conventional lender at the term of their alternative loan or sell their property without defaulting or the property being foreclosed.
• Homeownership rates and housing wealth vary significantly by race.
• As FinTech and digitization continue to increase their footprint in Canada, there is an increasing need to implement data standards. Data standards can provide benefits like improved financial stability and efficiency gains across the mortgage lending life cycle.

Discover more insights

You can access most of the data in the report by using our Residential Mortgage Industry Data Dashboard. This interactive dashboard is a digital companion to the Residential Mortgage Industry Report.

Download the Report