This repository serves as the upstream data source for all Canadian Housing Observatory repositories and releases.
It builds monthly Canadian housing panel datasets from CREA MLS HPI data and Statistics Canada economic, demographic, credit, and CPI tables.
The main outputs are monthly provincial and (select) metropolitan panel datasets saved as RDS files under data/processed/.
- Data Sources
- Outputs
- Software Requirements
- Reproducing the Data
- Repository Structure
- Method Notes
- Known Data Lags and Limitations
- Citation
- License
This project uses publicly available data from the following sources:
| Source | Table or Product | Frequency | Use |
|---|---|---|---|
| CREA | MLS Home Price Index, Seasonally Adjusted Monthly | Monthly | Home price indexes and benchmark prices |
| Statistics Canada | Table 18-10-0004-01, Consumer Price Index, monthly, not seasonally adjusted | Monthly | CPI deflators |
| Statistics Canada | Table 34-10-0145-01, CMHC conventional mortgage lending rate, 5-year term | Monthly | Mortgage rate |
| Statistics Canada | Table 36-10-0639-01, Credit liabilities of households | Monthly | Mortgage credit |
| Statistics Canada | Table 36-10-0112-01, Current and capital accounts - Households, Canada | Quarterly | National household income |
| Statistics Canada | Table 36-10-0224-01, Household sector, current accounts, provincial and territorial | Annual | Provincial household disposable income |
| Statistics Canada | Table 17-10-0009-01, Population estimates | Quarterly | Population estimates |
| File | Description | Frequency | Coverage |
|---|---|---|---|
data/processed/monthly_provincial_panel.rds |
Monthly provincial housing panel | Monthly | 2005-01 to 2026-03 |
data/processed/monthly_metropolitan_panel.rds |
Monthly metropolitan housing panel | Monthly | 2005-01 to 2026-03 |
The provincial panel contains 9 provincial geographies. The metropolitan panel contains 50 CREA metropolitan geographies.
The project is written in R and uses renv for dependency management.
To get started, run:
renv::restore()Run the scripts from the repository root in the following order:
Rscript R/01_download_crea_hpi.R
Rscript R/02_statcan.R
Rscript R/03_crea.R
Rscript R/04_join_data.R| Script | Description |
|---|---|
| R/01_download_crea_hpi.R | Downloads and extracts the latest available CREA MLS HPI workbook |
| R/02_statcan.R | Downloads and prepares Statistics Canada source tables |
| R/03_crea.R | Parses CREA HPI worksheets and saves geography-level intermediate files |
| R/04_join_data.R | Joins CREA and Statistics Canada data into final monthly panel datasets |
R/
01_download_crea_hpi.R
02_statcan.R
03_crea.R
04_join_data.R
data/
raw/
crea/
intermediate/
crea/
statcan/
processed/
renv/
renv.lock
DESCRIPTION
Makefile
CREA benchmark prices are converted to 2023 dollars using CPI values from Statistics Canada Table 18-10-0004-01.
Mortgage credit growth, income growth, and population growth are calculated as year-over-year log changes.
Quarterly population data are joined using the corresponding calendar quarter. Annual provincial household disposable income is joined to each month by calendar year.
Household disposable income per capita is calculated as annual real household disposable income divided by average quarterly population for the same province and year.
Statistics Canada source tables are released on a different schedule than the CREA MLS HPI dataset. As a result, the most recent months (e.g. 2025, 2026) may contain missing values for some joined variables.
Currently:
- Mortgage credit data end in 2026-02, while CREA data extend to 2026-03.
- Provincial household disposable income data end in 2024, so income-based measures are missing for 2025 and 2026.
When using this repository, please cite this repo, and also cite the original data providers.
Liang, M. (2026). Canadian Housing Observatory Data Repository [Data and code]. GitHub. https://github.com/mlian031/canhp-data
Statistics Canada. (2026). Table 18-10-0004-01 Consumer Price Index, monthly, not seasonally adjusted [Data table]. https://doi.org/10.25318/1810000401-eng
Statistics Canada. (2026). Table 34-10-0145-01 Canada Mortgage and Housing Corporation, conventional mortgage lending rate, 5-year term [Data table]. https://doi.org/10.25318/3410014501-eng
Statistics Canada. (2026). Table 36-10-0639-01 Credit liabilities of households [Data table]. https://doi.org/10.25318/3610063901-eng
Statistics Canada. (2026). Table 36-10-0112-01 Current and capital accounts - Households, Canada, quarterly [Data table]. https://doi.org/10.25318/3610011201-eng
Statistics Canada. (2025). Table 36-10-0224-01 Household sector, current accounts, provincial and territorial, annual [Data table]. https://doi.org/10.25318/3610022401-eng
Statistics Canada. (2026). Table 17-10-0009-01 Population estimates, quarterly [Data table]. https://doi.org/10.25318/1710000901-eng
Canadian Real Estate Association. MLS® Home Price Index [Data product]. https://www.crea.ca/housing-market-stats/mls-home-price-index
The code in this repository is licensed under the MIT License. See LICENSE.