DEVELOPING Person on fire outside Trump's hush money trial rushed away on a stretcher
A person who was on fire in a park outside the New York courthouse where Donald Trump’s hush money trial is taking place has been rushed away on a stretcher.
As Canadian home prices continue to rise and become increasingly unaffordable, parents are giving their adult children record amounts of money -- even outpacing home price inflation -- to help with the expensive purchase, a move that also widens the wealth gap, according to a CIBC report.
The report, published on Monday, found that roughly 30 per cent of first-time homebuyers and nearly nine per cent of existing homeowners received financial help from family this past year to purchase a house, according to CIBC data. First-time buyers received an average gift size of $82,000, while “mover-uppers” were gifted a whopping average of $128,000 in September 2021.
In 2015, close to 20 per cent of first-time homebuyers received an average of $52,000 in help from family members. During the pandemic, the number of families helping out was steady among first-time buyers and fell slightly among those who had purchased a home before. The overall amount of money parents have given their children since 2015, however, has increased and decreased, tracking fluctuations in housing prices, but outpaced home price inflation by two percentage points at 9.7 per cent per year.
“Overall we estimate that over the past year, gifting amounted to just over $10 billion, accounting for 10% of total down payments in the market as a whole during that period,” wrote Benjamin Tal, Deputy Chief Economist of CIBC World Markets, and the author of the report.
Tal noted that while there has been speculation that suggests many parents have gone into debt to help their children, the numbers do not necessarily support that assumption. Looking at data from credit reporting agency Equifax, he estimated that only 5.5 per cent of parents who gave money to their kids in 2020 to help with their down payment went into debt to finance that money. And while it’s a higher percentage than it was in 2019 in most major cities, especially in Vancouver, the 5.5 per cent rate was still relatively low, he said.
“It seems that a large portion of the gifting comes from parents’ savings, which of course grew notably during the pandemic—allowing for the increases in the size of the average gift,” Tal wrote in his report.
Providing this gift helps narrow the wealth gap somewhat among parents, Tal says, but it creates greater inequality between homebuyers who have help from parents and those who do not.
“That increase in the gap is much larger than the actual gift size as it might make the difference between owning and not-owning a house, with receivers potentially benefiting from future home price appreciation,” he wrote. It can also generate significant interest payment savings if the amount of mortgage being carried by these homebuyers is smaller, he added.
For homebuyers who received gifts that form the bulk of their down payment -- that’s two-thirds of first-time buyers -- the average gift amount rose even higher to $104,000. Among existing home owners using a gifted amount to cover most of their down payment, the average jumped to $157,000.
The average gift size for markets like Toronto and Vancouver are even higher, with first-time buyers in Toronto receiving an average of $130,000 during the first three quarters of 2021, and $200,000 among non-first timers. In Vancouver, those gifts were an eye-popping $180,000 and $340,000 on average among first-time buyers and existing homeowners looking to buy again.
“Given the trend and the size of gifting, it is clear that this phenomenon is becoming an important factor impacting housing demand and therefore home prices in Canada,” the report said.
A person who was on fire in a park outside the New York courthouse where Donald Trump’s hush money trial is taking place has been rushed away on a stretcher.
Soulful gospel artist Mandisa, a Grammy-winning singer who got her start as a contestant on 'American Idol' in 2006, has died, according to a statement on her verified social media. She was 47.
Scottish comedian Samantha Hannah was working on a comedy show about finding a husband when Toby Hunter came into her life. What happened next surprised them both.
The Senate legal affairs committee has rejected a motion calling for members to take a $50,000 field trip to the African Lion Safari in southern Ontario to see the zoo's elephant exhibit.
A Manitoba woman thought she found a miracle natural supplement, but said a hidden ingredient wreaked havoc on her health.
A man wearing a fake explosive vest and making threats was detained Friday outside the Iranian Consulate in Paris after police locked down the area, authorities said. His motive was unclear.
Group of Seven foreign ministers warned of new sanctions against Iran on Friday for its drone and missile attack on Israel, and urged both sides to avoid an escalation of the conflict.
The Canadian Food Inspection Agency is encouraging veterinarians to keep an eye out for signs of avian influenza in dairy cattle following recent discoveries of cases of the disease in U.S. cow herds.
Hospital chaplain J.S. Park opens up about death, grief and hearing thousands of last words, and shares his advice for the living.
At 6'8" and 350 pounds, there is nothing typical about UBC offensive lineman Giovanni Manu, who was born in Tonga and went to high school in Pitt Meadows.
Kevin the cat has been reunited with his family after enduring a harrowing three-day ordeal while lost at Toronto Pearson International Airport earlier this week.
Molly Knight, a grade four student in Nova Scotia, noticed her school library did not have many books on female athletes, so she started her own book drive in hopes of changing that.
Almost 7,000 bars of pure gold were stolen from Pearson International Airport exactly one year ago during an elaborate heist, but so far only a tiny fraction of that stolen loot has been found.
When Les Robertson was walking home from the gym in North Vancouver's Lower Lonsdale neighbourhood three weeks ago, he did a double take. Standing near a burrow it had dug in a vacant lot near East 1st Street and St. Georges Avenue was a yellow-bellied marmot.
A moulting seal who was relocated after drawing daily crowds of onlookers in Greater Victoria has made a surprise return, after what officials described as an 'astonishing' six-day journey.
Just steps from Parliament Hill is a barber shop that for the last 100 years has catered to everyone from prime ministers to tourists.
A high score on a Foo Fighters pinball machine has Edmonton player Dave Formenti on a high.
A compound used to treat sour gas that's been linked to fertility issues in cattle has been found throughout groundwater in the Prairies, according to a new study.