AND THE SURVEY SAYS…

2023 CHBA Homebuyer Preferences Study highlights buyer desires

BY TED McINTYRE

The eighth annual edition of the CHBA Homebuyer Preferences study has been released. A total of 74 home builders participated in 2022, and over 20,000 new homebuyers were surveyed, with data collected from 1,390 respondents across six provinces.

The study enables industry professionals to dynamically drill down on data that matters most to their organizations. For example, data sets can be narrowed to a specific age cohort, revealing the preferences for that demographic. The response data can also be filtered by various local regions, buyer type, home type, home price and other key fields.

“With the pandemic, we saw an accelerated shift towards preferences for digital resources when making home-purchasing decisions. In the home features section of the study, there was an increase in importance for ‘rooms’ and a decrease in the desire to be close to work and amenities,” the study notes. “Time will tell how many of those preferences are here to stay.”

The survey asked recent homebuyers for their opinions on more than 50 in-depth areas of home design, building features, buying preferences and

When asked what they’d be willing to sacrifice in order to make their current home more affordable, the most popular response again this year was a smaller home (21.4%), followed by being located farther from work and amenities (19.1%), neither of which have changed significantly since the study began.

Survey participants were also asked what they would spend an extra $10,000 on if they had the funds available. Interior finishes/ options continue to trend down but still rank first at 24.4%. Energy efficiency is the next most selected option at 16.3%. Notably, the agingin-place features category, first introduced as an option last year, has gone up this year, with 9.4% of respondents saying they’d put more money behind those features. That number goes up to 25% for Boomers and Pre-Boomers.

To check out this year’s survey, visit: Chba.ca/CHBADocs/CHBA/ Publications/2023-CHBA-CanadianHome-Buyer-Preferences.pdf.