There was a time when the path to adulthood in Canada seemed relatively straightforward: finish school. Get a job. Get married. Buy a house. Have a couple of kids. Spend the next 25 years paying off the mortgage. Preferably, somewhere along the way, purchase a station wagon.
But much like the station wagon, that timeline seems to have largely disappeared.
Today, people are getting married later, having children later, changing careers more frequently and—perhaps most noticeably—buying their first homes later. Which raises a question I hear more often than you might expect: “Am I too old to be buying my first home?”
If you’re 38, 42, 47 or even 55 and have spent the last decade watching Toronto real estate prices climb while wondering whether you somehow missed your opportunity, I understand why it might feel that way.
But the answer is quite simple: No.
In fact, buying your first home later in life may come with some significant advantages.
The First-Time Home Buyer Is Getting Older
Let’s start by abandoning the idea that every first-time buyer is a 28-year-old couple shopping for a starter condo.
That buyer certainly exists. But they’re far from alone.
Statistics Canada reported that among Canadians who had purchased their first home in the five years leading up to its 2018 Canadian Housing Survey, only about half were under 35. In Toronto, that number was just 41.2%. In other words, even then, the majority of Toronto’s recent first-time buyers were 35 or older.
More recent Ontario data suggest the trend has continued. Teranet land-registry data reported by Realist put the average age of an Ontario first-time home buyer at approximately 40 in 2025, compared with 36 a decade earlier.
So if you found this article by searching for the average age of a first-time home buyer in Canada, the more important takeaway isn’t whether the answer is precisely 35, 37 or 40.
It’s that buying your first home in your late 30s or 40s is increasingly normal… And in a city like Toronto, that shouldn’t be particularly surprising.
Buying your first home? Check out these posts next:
- How to Buy A Home in Toronto Without Overpaying
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- Waiting on the World to Buy a Home?
Why Are People Buying Their First Homes Later?
The obvious answer is affordability. Statistics Canada found that roughly 1.3 million Canadian households bought their first home between 2018 and 2022. The median household income among those buyers was $114,950 in 2022, yet more than one in five reported being dissatisfied with the affordability of their housing.
Saving a down payment while paying Toronto rent isn’t exactly a cheat code for accumulating wealth.
But affordability isn’t the only explanation.
People are spending longer in school. Careers take time to establish. Relationships and families are forming later. Some people spend their 20s and 30s travelling or pursuing careers rather than worrying about lawn maintenance and property taxes.
And some simply prefer renting.
There is nothing inherently wrong with any of those choices.
The mistake is assuming that because you didn’t buy at 28, buying at 42 no longer makes sense.
There Are Actually Advantages to Buying Later
We spend a lot of time talking about the disadvantage of waiting: namely, that real estate may become more expensive.
But there’s another side to the equation.
A 40-year-old first-time buyer is often in a substantially different financial position than they were at 28.
Your income may be higher. You may have accumulated meaningful savings. Your credit history is longer. You may have investments, an RRSP and an FHSA. If you’re buying with a partner, you may have two established incomes rather than two people at the beginning of their careers.
There’s also something considerably less quantifiable but equally valuable:
You probably know yourself better.
I’ve worked with plenty of younger buyers who are trying to predict what their lives will look like five years from now.
- Will we have kids?
- Will we need another bedroom?
- Will we still work downtown?
- Do we want a condo or a house?
- Do we actually like this neighbourhood, or did we just have a really good dinner here last Saturday?
An older buyer often has much clearer answers, and that can lead to a better purchase.
Learn more about the home-buying process with these posts next:
- What’s a Status Certificate and Why Do I Care?
- What to Expect at a Home Viewing
- Closing Date Vs. Possession Date: What’s the Difference?
You May Be Able to Skip the “Starter Home”
This is one of the more interesting advantages of buying later.
Traditionally, buyers climbed the so-called property ladder.
Buy a one-bedroom condo. Build some equity. Sell it. Buy a two-bedroom condo or townhouse. Build more equity. Eventually buy the family home.
That strategy worked extremely well for many people.
But an older first-time buyer with greater savings and income may be able to skip one or even two of those steps.
Rather than buying something you already know you’ll outgrow, you may be able to purchase a property capable of serving you for 10, 15 or 20 years.
That matters because moving isn’t free. There are legal fees, commissions when you eventually sell, moving expenses and, in Toronto, potentially substantial land transfer taxes when you buy again.
Buying the right home once can be a perfectly reasonable alternative to buying three homes on your way there.
But Older First-Time Buyers Need to Think Differently
This is where age does become relevant.
If you’re 28 and take out a 30-year mortgage, theoretically you’re mortgage-free at 58.
If you take out that same mortgage at 48, you’re looking at 78.
That doesn’t mean you shouldn’t buy.
It means the question shouldn’t simply be:
“How much house can the bank approve me for?”
It should be:
“How does this house fit into the rest of my financial life?”
Retirement savings become more important as you get older. So does your expected income trajectory. A 35-year-old may reasonably expect another 25 or 30 years of peak earnings. Someone buying at 55 needs to think much more carefully about what their income and mortgage will look like at 65.
Longer amortizations can reduce monthly payments, but they also increase the total interest paid over the life of the mortgage. The Financial Consumer Agency of Canada specifically cautions borrowers to consider that trade-off.
The goal shouldn’t necessarily be to have your mortgage paid off before retirement at all costs. But there should be a plan.
Got mortgage questions? Check out these posts next:
- How to Choose the Right Type of Mortgage
- Fixed Rate Vs. Variable Rate Mortgage: A Guide for Home Buyers
- What is a Vendor Take-Back Mortgage?
Don’t Sacrifice Your Retirement to Buy a House
This is probably the biggest warning I would give an older first-time buyer.
At 30, draining your savings to purchase a home isn’t necessarily advisable, but you have considerable time to rebuild. At 50, that runway is shorter.
Putting every available dollar into a down payment while leaving yourself with no investments, no emergency fund and no retirement savings may turn one financial problem into another.
Homeownership is a form of wealth building, but your house shouldn’t necessarily be your only asset. The right purchase is therefore not always the maximum purchase.
Sometimes buying the $900,000 property and maintaining $200,000 of investments makes considerably more sense than buying the $1.1-million property and emptying every account you have.
That’s a financial-planning decision as much as a real-estate decision.
Take Advantage of Being a First-Time Buyer
Here’s another misconception worth clearing up:
Being 45 doesn’t disqualify you from first-time-buyer programs simply because you don’t look like the couple smiling beside the moving boxes in the bank advertisement.
For example, eligible Canadians can open a First Home Savings Account (FHSA) as long as they meet the first-time-buyer requirements and are no more than 71 years old at the end of the year the account is opened. Contributions are generally tax deductible, investment growth can occur tax-free and qualifying withdrawals toward a home are not taxable. The lifetime contribution limit is $40,000.
There’s also the Home Buyers’ Plan, which currently allows eligible buyers to withdraw up to $60,000 from their RRSP toward a qualifying home. It can be used alongside an FHSA.
And first-time buyers with an insured mortgage can now qualify for amortization periods of up to 30 years, although—as discussed above—lower payments need to be weighed against higher lifetime interest costs.
For someone who has spent 15 or 20 years accumulating savings and RRSP assets without owning a home, these programs can become meaningful pieces of the down-payment puzzle.
Learn more about the various Government Incentives and Programs for First-Time Home Buyers in Toronto.
Don’t Forget the Benefits of Renting
Now for the part you might not expect to hear from a real estate broker….Sometimes you shouldn’t buy.
Homeownership isn’t a graduation ceremony from renting. Renting offers flexibility. It requires less capital. Major repairs generally aren’t your responsibility. And depending on the relationship between rents and purchase prices, renting while investing the difference can sometimes be financially compelling.
If you’re 50, love your rental, pay substantially below-market rent and aren’t sure where you’ll want to live in five years, buying a home simply because you think you’re “supposed to” isn’t much of a strategy.
Which brings us to the bigger question.
When Should You Buy a House?
People understandably want a numerical answer.
Buy before 30. Buy before 40. Buy before prices rise. Buy when interest rates fall.
But when should you buy a house? My answer has always been much less exciting: When your life and finances are ready for one.
Ideally, that means you have stable income, sufficient savings for the down payment and closing costs, an emergency reserve after closing, and enough room in your monthly budget that the mortgage doesn’t dictate every other financial decision you make.
Just as importantly, you should have a reasonable expectation that you’ll want to remain in the property long enough to justify the considerable transaction costs associated with buying and selling.
That’s true whether you’re 28 or 58.
What happens after you’ve bought the house? Read these posts next for more insights:
- The Real Reason Home Maintenance is So Important
- Taxes Every Toronto Home Buyer and Seller Should Know
- Are There Benefits to Refinancing Your Home?
Maybe Being “Late” Isn’t Such a Bad Thing
Real estate has an unusual ability to make people compare themselves with everyone around them.
Your friend bought a condo at 26.
Your sister bought a house at 31.
Your colleague bought ten years ago and won’t stop telling you what he paid for it.
Congratulations to all of them.
Their circumstances aren’t yours.
Yes, purchasing earlier gives you more years to build equity and potentially benefit from appreciation.
But purchasing later can mean entering the market with more money, greater income, better financial discipline and a much clearer understanding of what you’re actually buying.
The objective isn’t to become a homeowner as quickly as possible.
It’s to make a good real estate decision.
So if you’re 40, 45 or 50 and wondering whether you’ve missed your chance to buy your first home, I’d change the question.
Don’t ask:
“Am I too late?”
Ask:
“Does buying a home make sense for me now?”
Because those are two very different questions.
And if the answer to the second one is yes, then your age probably isn’t the thing that should stop you.
Thinking about buying your first home? Let’s chat! Get in touch with Toronto Realty Group by filling out the form on this page, calling us, or sending us an email directly.
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