Many first-time home buyers need to do some more research into the costs of home ownership and mortgage rules before they take the plunge, if the results of a newly released Canada Mortgage and Housing Corporation (CMHC) survey are anything to go by.
In October 2017, the CMHC carried out the survey of 2,507 Canadians who are planning on buying a home in the next two years. Of those surveyed, just 66 per cent of first-time-buyer respondents said they have a good understanding of the full cost of homeownership (including mortgage payments, property taxes, condo fees, utility and maintenance costs), with the remaining one-third of buyers admitting they do not fully understand all the costs.
This compares with 79 per cent of previous home owners (who do not currently own a home) and 85 per cent of current home owners.
Most first-time buyers also didn’t know about the new mortgage “stress test” under which they will have to qualify for a mortgage. Only 36 per cent of first-time buyers surveyed were aware of the latest mortgage qualification changes, with the remaining 64 per cent admitting they did not know about the new rules. Awareness increases to 53 per cent among previous owners and a still-low 58 per cent among current owners.
Among those first-time-buyer respondents who said they were not previously aware of the mortgage qualification rule changes, only 20 per cent said that this change will impact their purchase decision in some way.
The full survey results can be found here.
