According to CMHC, "An affordable dwelling is where the renter household is spending no more than 30% of its gross income on rent".

For 2021, the CMHC report mentioed that most centres report a relative lack of affordable units for households in the lowest income quintiles, with several centres reporting declines in such units since the previous survey.

The Data below shows the hours of work needed per month to keep monthly rent at 30% of gross income for a 2-bedroom purpose-built rental apartment.

These data points estimate the total number of hours an individual would have to work in a month to afford the average rent on a two-bedroom apartment, assuming they are earning the average wage in their area of living. The average hourly wage earnings was obtained from Statistics Canada for the Canadian Rental Market Report, and it is adjusted for each area. Full-time employment equates to 150 hours a month.

This data has been extracted from the Canadian Rental Market Report which was published in February 2022.