It will take women in Toronto five more years on average than men to save for a down payment on a house due to the gender pay gap, a new study says.
According to Zoocasa, a real estate listing site, who cite the Canadian Women’s Foundation, a woman earns just 84 cents for every dollar a man makes, leaving a 16-per cent pay gap, and subsequently making it more difficult for women to save for a down payment.
Zoocasa calculated how long it would take both men and women to save for a 20 per cent down payment by assuming each saves 7.2 per cent of their annual income, which is in keeping with Statistics Canada’s Q3 2024 household savings rate.
According to the study, the national average saving time for a man is 18 years; for a woman it is 20 years and 10 months.
In the Greater Toronto Area (GTA), it would take a man earning $100,000 annually 29 years and 10 months to save for a 20 per cent down payment on a house, while it would take a woman 34 years and six months.
In Hamilton, it would take a man 24 years and seven months to save for a home, in comparison it would take a woman 28 years and six months. Meanwhile, male home buyers in Waterloo will have to save for 21 years and one month, and female buyers will need to save for 24 years and six months.
“This doesn’t even include the compounded financial burdens faced by racialized women and women with disabilities, where the pay gap is even more significant,” Zoocasa said in the report..
If men had to pay 16 per cent more for a home, that would reflect the financial disadvantage women face due to the pay gap, the study says, and if this were the case, Greater Toronto’s average home price would jump from $1,074,542 to $1.2 million.
Moreover, Canada’s average home price is $649,096, meaning a 16-per cent increase would raise it to $752,951, while a 16-decrease would bring it to $545,241.If rents were reduced by 16 per cent in favour of women to reflect the gender pay gap, nearly 87 per cent of one-bedroom apartments across Canada would fall below $2,000 a month, according to the study.
“While progress has been made toward gender equality in many areas, the impact of income disparity is still profound, especially as inflation and the cost of living rise and women remain single longer. These challenges have a compounding effect over time,” the study concluded.
For example, a single woman saving for a down payment in Vancouver will have to wait 41 years and six months to do so, this is the longest saving period of any city included in the study.
On the contrary, the shortest amount of time it would take a woman to save for a 20 per cent down payment is 10 years and three months, but she’d have to live in Saguenay, QC. Meanwhile, it would take a man eight years and 10 months to save for a house in the same city.
