With millennials comprising about 25% of Canada’s population, this segment is poised to outstrip their baby boomer parents in the real estate market as they start moving into their family-rearing years and purchase homes.

A large part of this population lives in major job growth hubs like Toronto and Vancouver, driving sales of single-family homes and starter condos in these areas. Experts said that affordability plays a central role in millennials’ purchasing decisions, even as the sector is willing to pay an average of $1,800 per month to rent condos close to their workplaces. This is because the average resale price of a Toronto condo is now approaching half a million dollars.

The demographic shift has forced developers to focus on the development of rental structures, with the expectation that a significant proportion of millennials would prefer to rent for life.

These projections line up with expert observations that millennials are more attracted to a job and a lifestyle, as opposed to owning cars or homes.

“Many of them, especially in the United States, have become skeptical of this notion of a house as an investment,” York University director of real estate and infrastructure program James McKellar told the Toronto Star.

“Millennials and the subset before them, the late 30-somethings, are probably the first generation of people who are living their early adult life in urban centres. For them, home has more to do with being part of a complete community than it did in their parents’ generation, when it was about having a backyard, a picket fence and a two-car garage,” Tas DesignBuild president and CEO Mazyar Mortazavi agreed.

Millennials a Force to Be Reckoned with in Real Estate Market by Canadian Real Estate Wealth