If you have been holding off having kids to try and save up for a down payment on a home in Calgary, a new report has revealed you are shaving off some serious time to grow your bank account.
Zoocasa looked into how long it would take to accumulate enough money for a 20% down payment on a home across the country, with DINKs — short for “Double Income, No Kids” — coming out on top compared to couples that decided to have a child before homeownership.
According to 2022 data from Statistics Canada, the median after-tax income for two-parent households with children is $122,000, while couples without children have a median after-tax income of $96,700.
Using the Canadian Real Estate Association’s (CREA) October 2024 report on average home prices, Zoocasa estimated how long each group would save for a 20% down payment.
The online real estate platform says that those with children save 7.2% of their annual income, consistent with Statistics Canada’s Q3 2024 household savings rate, to build their down payment.
When it comes to couples without children, Zoocasa calculated how much they might save by redirecting the annual costs typically associated with raising a child (low, medium, and high-income scenarios) toward their down payment, accumulating savings year over year.
By using those metrics if you are part of a dual-income, one-child scenario in Calgary, on average it will take 13.1 years to save for a 20% down payment on a home.
Zoocasa
That timeline speeds up drastically when it moves to DINKs, with couples with a low income taking approximately eight years, couples with a medium income taking approximately six years, and couples with a high income taking approximately five years.
You can check out the full report here.