Kijiji Rental Trend Report: March 2021

Our Marketplace

In March 2021, Kijiji saw a 3.9% increase in new rental listings when compared to March 2020. The 166K+ listings were over 20K more than the February mark of 144K+ listings – marking the high point of new listings listed in a month for 2021.

On the demand side of the marketplace, the Real Estate category saw increases that showed Canadians were not only actively searching for a new home but were also reaching out to individuals and businesses advertising vacant properties.

Kijiji users came back to the marketplace 4% more than they did in February and searched for 13.31 minutes – a 6.6% increase over the time they spent searching in February. Still, the largest increase was seen in engagements (email replies, URL clicks, and phone reveals) – which saw a 13% increase over February resulting in 1.2M+ engagements in the month of March.

Top 5 Canadian Rental prices (2 bedrooms)

When looking at 2-bedroom properties, Vancouver retained its spot as the most expensive city to find a two-bedroom home for rent in Canada. Interestingly, Toronto remained in the top three but is continuing to experience dramatic declines in rental prices with a 10% decline year over year. Prices of two-bedroom properties in Hamilton and Guelph, both neighbouring Toronto, are up over 3.3% and 6.5% respectively.

Affordability Rankings

When looking at all property types in the For Rent category we are seeing two stories emerge at the top and bottom of the rental market:

• Four of the top cities – Vancouver (-0.3%), Toronto (-15%), Ottawa (-2.6%), Victoria (-2.9%) with the highest rent in March 2021 are experiencing declines from their March 2020 rates.
• The trend changes when looking at the cities and towns (all concentrated in Quebec) as Saguenay, Sherbrooke, Drummondville and Granby have had their median rent/month increase by at least 4% when compared to March 2020.

Popularity

Cities continue to be where most Kijiji users are interested in finding a new home – and this is true in all provinces.

In Montreal, we saw a 33% increase in properties viewed and a 59% increase in engagements (email replies, phone reveals, and URL clicks) over February – likely as a result of Montrealers getting prepared for Moving Day on July 1.