Monthly Down Payment Monitor: April 2025
When mortgage rates are all anyone talks about, it can be easy to forget just how important a down payment is when you're a Canadian home buyer.
Even when rates were at historic lows, you would have been left out of the feeding frenzy if your down payment savings fell short of the required minimums.
That’s why NerdWallet developed our Monthly Down Payment Monitor: to help Canadian home buyers understand how much they might need to save in order to get approved for a mortgage.
Unlike interest rates, your down payment is something you can control. Once you have an idea of how much to save, you can build a savings strategy around that target amount.
Every dollar you put away literally gets you closer to owning your own home.
Read the 2025 Canadian Home Buyer Report
Find out how would-be buyers and current home owners are feeling about the state of the market.
Down payment requirements in Canada: April 2025
The information in the following table is based on Canada’s minimum down payment guidelines and the average sale prices for March 2025 provided by provincial real estate associations.
Average Sale Price — March 2025 | Minimum Down Payment Required | 20% Down Payment | |
|---|---|---|---|
B.C. | $963,323 | $71,332 | $192,665 |
Alberta | $524,755 | $27,476 | $104,951 |
Saskatchewan | $338,869 | $16,943 | $67,774 |
Manitoba | $399,132 | $19,957 | $79,826 |
Ontario | $860,545 | $61,055 | $172,109 |
Quebec | $529,546 | $27,955 | $105,909 |
New Brunswick | $343,027 | $17,151 | $68,605 |
Nova Scotia | $477,054 | $23,853 | $95,411 |
PEI | $418,649 | $20,932 | $83,730 |
Newfoundland | $352,370 | $17,619 | $70,474 |
Regional highlight: Manitoba
Despite the economic uncertainty that limited March home buying in some provinces, the Manitoba housing market had a strong month, with sales increasing almost 25% compared to February.
With so many food processing, manufacturing and transportation jobs in the province, the U.S. tariff war poses a real threat to both Manitoba’s economy and its housing market. Fortunately for buyers who brave the uncertainty, home prices in the province remain relatively low.
(Real estate boards sometimes use different measurements when analyzing their data, like average price, median price and benchmark price. If you’re interested in learning about these differences, we explain them at the bottom of this page.)
Winnipeg (Regional):
Average single-family sale price: $470,399
Minimum down payment required: $23,520
Average condo sale price: $277,068
Minimum down payment required: $13,853
Brandon:
Average single-family sale price: $365,297
Minimum down payment required: $18,265
Average condo sale price: $336,650
Minimum down payment required: $16,833
Down payment savings tip: What to do amid tariff chaos
It’s a confusing time to be a home buyer. On one hand, market conditions are improving — demand is low, inventory is rising and mortgage rates are fairly approachable. On the other, if Donald Trump’s trade war spirals out of control, it could be doomsday for the Canadian economy.
The latter scenario might have you hitting pause on a home purchase, but don’t let it interfere with your down payment savings plan. Think of this as an opportunity to build your down payment even further before handing it over to a lender.
If your finances allow it, keep putting aside the same amount of cash into your TFSA, FHSA or high interest savings account that you have been so far. Once this tariff nonsense subsides, you want to be ready for the market rebound.
Just because your home purchase is delayed doesn’t mean you should take your eyes off the prize.
- Home price terminology
Average price: This is the total sales volume, calculated in dollars, divided by the number of home sales. A monthly average price can be swayed by a few expensive properties, which makes it a somewhat unreliable metric for describing market trends. If three $10 million homes are sold in one month in Toronto, for example, it would increase the average price, but it wouldn’t necessarily mean all prices are rising.
Benchmark price: Benchmark prices are an interesting alternative to average prices. They’re the prices that buyers are expected to pay for a particular property type. Benchmark prices are determined using the Canadian Real Estate Association’s MLS Home Price Index, which is more of a modelling tool than an analysis of what’s actually happening in the market.
Median price: Median price is essentially the mid-point between the lowest- and highest-priced homes sold over a particular period. Half of the homes sold would be more expensive than the median, the other half would be less. It’s difficult to gauge the market using median price since it leaves you wondering how high home prices might be.
DIVE EVEN DEEPER
Clay Jarvis
Barry Choi
