Markham · OntarioNew to Canada

New to Canada and buying in Markham

Q: What transfer tax applies to a $1,208,692 purchase in Markham?

About $20,649 at the average. It is paid in cash on closing (or, in Quebec, billed by the municipality afterwards) and cannot be added to the mortgage. An eligible first-time buyer recovers about $4,000 of it through the Ontario relief that applies here. Our land transfer tax calculator runs your own price.

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Quick scenario · Markham

On a $1,208,692 Markham home

Down payment

7.9% — 5% to $500K + 10% above

$95,870

Insurance premium

4.00% CMHC/Sagen/CG · financed

$44,513

Mortgage amount

At 4.19% · 30-yr amort

$1,157,335

ON LTT

Provincial closing cost

$20,649

Est. monthly payment

Principal + interest only

$5,628/mo

Assumes permanent resident status. A foreign national on a work or study permit owes $302,173 of Non-Resident Speculation Tax on this purchase as well, in cash at closing — see the section on it below.

The payment above uses a 30-year amortization. An insured file only gets one as a first-time buyer or on new construction, and property owned abroad in the last four calendar years ends that — at 25 years the same mortgage is $6,208/mo.

Illustrative only. Actual rate, qualifying amount, and premium depend on your file. A licensed advisor will give you the exact number for your file.

New-to-Canada mortgages in Markham — the local picture

Markham's average price was $1,208,692 in August 2026. Newcomer files are ordinary files in Markham, from Unionville to Cathedraltown, and they fail for an ordinary reason: the page you read before this one priced a purchase for a permanent resident and you may not be one. What changes the arithmetic is not your credit history but your status: a permanent resident buying at Markham's $1,208,692 average price needs $95,870 down and about $123,939 in total cash at closing, while a foreign national on a work permit buying the identical house owes Ontario's 25% Non-Resident Speculation Tax — $302,173 — on top of it.

Markham average selling price, TRREB Market Watch, August 2026. Source.

Written by the Mortgage Squad Advisors Editorial Team · Reviewed by Surrayya Afzal, Principal Broker, FSRA #M14001433 · Brokerage FSRA #13737 · Figures current to August 2026

All mortgages in Markham| New-to-Canada mortgages guide| Affordability calculator

PR min down

On insured mortgages

Work permit

5% min

Insurable to 95% LTV; lenders overlay more

Intl credit

90+

Countries via Equifax Intl

Languages in-house

15+

Plus Maya AI 24/7

New-to-Canada mortgages: Markham against the markets around it

The same arithmetic (5% to $500,000, 10% above, 20% over $1.5M) on each market’s own published figure. Rates do not change across the boundary; the price does, and with it the file.

Market	Price	Legal minimum down	vs Markham
Markham	$1,208,692 average	$95,870	—
Vaughan	$1,234,758 average	$98,476	+$2,606
Richmond Hill	$1,205,777 average	$95,578	−$292
Newmarket	$1,048,321 average	$79,833	−$16,037
Aurora	$1,105,004 average	$85,501	−$10,369

Each figure is that market’s own board release, as cited on its page. Illustrative arithmetic, not a quote.

Your status decides the file: three paths on the same Markham home

Your immigration status, not your credit history, is what changes the arithmetic. This is the whole difference on Markham’s $1,208,692 average.

Your status	Minimum down payment	Non-Resident Speculation Tax	Federal purchase ban	Insured amortization
Permanent resident	$95,870 (7.9%) — the federal tiered minimum	None. A permanent resident is not a foreign national.	Exempt outright — the Act does not apply to you.	25 years insured, 30 only as a first-time buyer or on new construction
Work permit (foreign national)	$95,870 at the insurer minimum — lenders commonly overlay more	$302,173 at closing — rebatable in full if you become a permanent resident within 4 years of registration	Exempt with 183+ days left on the permit and no more than one property bought	25 years insured, on the same two exceptions
Study permit (foreign national)	Capped by a $500,000 purchase price the local market does not reach	Applies in full, with no relief route available on this path	Exempt only with 5 years of filed returns, 244 days in Canada in each of them, and a price at or under $500,000	25 years insured

Down payments are the federal tiered rule applied to this market’s own average; the Non-Resident Speculation Tax column is Ontario’s statutory rate on the same figure. Individual lenders set higher down-payment requirements than the insurers do on non-permanent-resident files — that overlay is what we shop.

The same Markham house, two closing days

Take Markham's $1,208,692 average price and change nothing but the buyer's status. A permanent resident puts $95,870 down (7.9% — 5% of the first $500,000 and 10% of the rest), finances a 4.00% default-insurance premium of $44,513 into the mortgage, and brings $123,939 to the lawyer once you add $20,649 of land transfer and registration cost, the $3,561 of provincial sales tax on that premium — which cannot be financed — and roughly $3,859 of legal, title, inspection and adjustments. A foreign national on a work permit, insured to the identical loan-to-value at the identical minimum down payment, brings $426,112 — $302,173 more, and every dollar of the difference is NRST. Put a conventional 20% down instead, which is roughly where lender overlays on non-permanent-resident files tend to land, and the cash needed is $570,585: no insurance premium and no premium tax, but $241,738 of down payment sitting beside the same $302,173 of tax. The monthly payment is the smaller story — $6,208 against $5,332 in principal and interest at 4.19% over 25 years. The closing-day number is the one that decides whether the purchase happens, and it is the reason the single most valuable thing many work-permit buyers can do is wait for permanent residence rather than shop harder for a rate.

Sources: Ontario Ministry of Finance — Non-Resident Speculation Tax; federal Prohibition on the Purchase of Residential Property by Non-Canadians Act. Which insurer accepts which newcomer file is set out on our new-to-Canada mortgage guide.

Building a Markham approval without Canadian credit

A thin or non-existent Canadian credit file doesn't have to stall a Markham purchase. Three paths work: an international Equifax or TransUnion report covering 90+ countries; alternative credit built from rent, utilities, telecom, and insurance payment history; and the banks' dedicated newcomer programs — RBC Newcomer Advantage, Scotiabank StartRight, BMO NewStart, TD New to Canada, CIBC Newcomer and National Bank's — none of which require established Canadian credit. We match your specific status — PR, work permit, or in-progress — to the lender most likely to say yes.

How a new-to-Canada mortgage works — the rules, the penalties and the paperwork that are the same in every city — is covered in full on our new-to-canada mortgages guide. This page keeps to what is different in Markham.

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New-to-Canada mortgages across Markham

From Unionville to Milliken Mills, the dominant property form in each pocket changes how a newcomer file is underwritten.

Unionville

Heritage core, executive detached, some condo

Condominiums are the most common newcomer entry point, and the corporation is assessed alongside a file that may already be relying on international credit — the status certificate review is not a formality here.

Cathedraltown, Box Grove

Newer detached and townhouse (planned community) · Newer detached and townhouse

A builder purchase asks for a rate hold reaching final closing, which is a long commitment on a file whose Canadian credit history is still short.

Berczy Village, Cornell, Wismer

2000s detached and semi subdivision · New-urbanist detached, town and laneway stock · 2000s detached family subdivision

Detached stock is where multi-generational households usually land, and lenders differ markedly on how many incomes they will combine on a single application.

Markham Village

Heritage detached and older freehold

Century and mid-century houses in the historic core: wiring, plumbing and roof age drive appraisal conditions, and heritage designation can restrict alterations in a way that affects both the appraisal and your insurance.

Milliken Mills

1980s detached, semi and townhouse

The most consistently insurable band in Markham, and a deep pool of comparable sales in every quarter. Multi-generational purchases are common and lenders differ on how they treat a co-borrower who will not occupy the home.

Regional Ontario lenders we shop — alongside the Big-6 banks and national monolines:

Meridian DUCA Alterna Savings FirstOntario

Markham market

What Markham’s market means for your new-to-Canada mortgage.

Markham straddles the $1.5-million line almost exactly

Few GTA markets sit as close to the mortgage-insurance boundary as Markham does. The July 2026 average detached sale here was $1,507,841 — within a rounding error of the $1.5-million ceiling above which CMHC, Sagen and Canada Guaranty insurance is simply unavailable. The all-types average was $1,131,324, well below it. That means a Markham detached search is a search across a cliff edge: at $1,480,000 the tiered minimum down payment applies — 5% on the first $500,000 plus 10% on the balance, about $123,000 — while at $1,520,000 default insurance cannot be purchased at all and the minimum is a full 20%, roughly $304,000. A $40,000 difference in price can be a $180,000 difference in cash required at closing. Crossing the line also removes the 30-year amortization available on insured mortgages to first-time buyers and new-build purchasers, so the payment the stress test is applied against rises on the same loan. None of this is a reason to avoid Markham detached; it is a reason to decide in advance which side of the ceiling your budget is on, and to treat the ceiling — not your pre-approval amount — as the number that governs the negotiation. Unionville and Cathedraltown will more often sit above it; the Highway 7 condo corridor and the townhome stock sit clearly below.

Pre-construction and assignment files along the Highway 7 corridor

Markham's condo pipeline generates a steady stream of files that look nothing like a resale purchase, and three features catch buyers. First, interim occupancy: you can take possession months before the building registers, paying an occupancy fee to the builder during that window that builds no equity and is not a mortgage payment. Second, the final-closing appraisal: your price was agreed years ago, but the lender values the unit as at closing day. If the appraisal comes in lower, the lender lends against the lower figure and the shortfall is cash you provide on top of your deposits. Third, assignments — selling your contract before closing — which carry HST, assignment-clause and lender considerations that a resale never does, and which not every lender will finance for the incoming buyer. The habit worth forming is to treat the purchase agreement, not the final closing, as the moment for the financing conversation. Deposit structure, the likely occupancy period, whether the builder's timeline can outlast a rate hold, and what happens if the appraisal disappoints are all knowable at signing and expensive to discover at closing. Our pre-construction mortgage page covers the sequence in detail.

An illustrative Markham file: forty thousand dollars, one hundred and eighty thousand in cash

This is an illustrative composite built from the rules above — not a specific client, and not a guaranteed outcome. A buyer is pre-approved with about $130,000 available for a down payment and closing costs, shopping detached homes in the low $1.4-millions where the tiered insured minimum comfortably fits. Competition pushes the accepted price just past $1.5 million. Because default insurance is unavailable above that line, the minimum down payment jumps from roughly 8.7% to a full 20% — a swing of well over $150,000 that has to appear in cash before closing, from savings, a gift, or an existing property. The pre-approval did not fail; the product did, because a different set of rules now applies to the same borrower. What prevents it is knowing the ceiling before the bidding starts and treating it as a hard budget constraint rather than a technicality. Given that Markham's detached average sat at $1,507,841 in July 2026, this is the ordinary case in this market rather than an unlucky one. Every real file is assessed on its own facts.

FAQ

New-to-Canada mortgages in Markham — common questions.

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What does a new-to-Canada mortgage work out to on Markham's August 2026 average price?

Markham average selling price, TRREB Market Watch put the Markham average at $1,208,692 for August 2026. For a new-to-Canada mortgage that makes the legal minimum down about $95,870 (5% to $500,000, 10% above, 20% over $1.5M). The same board counted 282 Markham sales in August 2026, with an average LDOM of 33 days. Your own property and balance replace these numbers on the file.

How does Markham compare with Vaughan, Richmond Hill and Newmarket for a new-to-Canada mortgage?

On each market's own cited figure, the legal minimum down is $95,870 in Markham against Vaughan $98,476 (average $1,234,758); Richmond Hill $95,578 (average $1,205,777); Newmarket $79,833 (average $1,048,321). The comparison is the same arithmetic on a different price, which is why moving the search one municipality over changes the file before it changes the rate — lenders price the same product the same way across Ontario.

What transfer tax applies to a $1,208,692 purchase in Markham?

About $20,649 at the average. It is paid in cash on closing (or, in Quebec, billed by the municipality afterwards) and cannot be added to the mortgage. An eligible first-time buyer recovers about $4,000 of it through the Ontario relief that applies here. Our land transfer tax calculator runs your own price.

What's the average newcomer file size in Markham?

Markham's average price is approximately $1,208,692, so the typical newcomer file we see here sits in the $1,027,388–$1,389,996 band. Your specific neighbourhood and property type can move that materially.

What does a new-to-Canada mortgage cost on a typical Markham home?

On Markham's $1,208,692 average price, a representative newcomer file at minimum down works out to about $95,870 down and roughly $5,628/mo (principal + interest at 4.19% over a 30-year amortization), plus about $20,649 in Ontario land transfer tax. Your exact numbers depend on the property and your file — we run them precisely before you commit.

Why use a Markham mortgage broker for a new-to-Canada mortgage?

A local broker knows GTA / York's property types and which of our 100+ lenders price newcomer files best in Markham — from Unionville and Cathedraltown condos to detached stock — and there's no fee to you on A-lender files. The regional lenders on that panel are listed under the neighbourhood table above.

Can I buy in Markham on a work permit?

Yes, on two conditions and with one large cost. The federal ban applies to residential property inside a census metropolitan area or census agglomeration, so you need 183 or more days of validity left on your permit at the date of purchase and you must not have bought more than one residential property. Financing is available: CMHC, Sagen and Canada Guaranty all insure a valid work permit to 95% loan-to-value, so the legal minimum down payment is the same $95,870 a permanent resident would put down, though individual lenders often require more. The cost is NRST at $302,173, which takes the cash you need at closing from about $123,939 to about $426,112.

Should I wait until I get permanent residence to buy in Markham?

If permanent residence is close, the arithmetic usually says yes. On the same $1,208,692 house, a permanent resident needs about $123,939 of cash at closing and a work-permit holder about $426,112 — a gap of $302,173 that is entirely NRST. It is rebatable in full if you become a permanent resident within 4 years of registration, so waiting is not the only route, but you have to find the money first and wait to get it back. Against that, waiting means whatever the market does in the meantime. We run both timelines with your actual numbers rather than arguing the principle.

Who regulates a new-to-Canada mortgage in Ontario?

Mortgage Squad Advisors is a licensed Ontario mortgage brokerage — FSRA (Financial Services Regulatory Authority of Ontario) Brokerage Licence #13737. All advisors are licensed and FINTRAC-trained, and every recommendation follows FSRA's conduct and disclosure rules.

New-to-Canada mortgages in Markham: helpful guides & tools

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