{"id":69015,"date":"2026-08-28T11:10:08","date_gmt":"2026-08-28T18:10:08","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/liv.rent\/blog\/?p=69015"},"modified":"2026-08-28T11:10:15","modified_gmt":"2026-08-28T18:10:15","slug":"buy-vs-rent-scarborough-ontario","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/liv.rent\/blog\/renters\/buy-vs-rent-scarborough-ontario\/","title":{"rendered":"Buy vs rent in Scarborough, Ontario: what renters need to know right now"},"content":{"rendered":"\n

What does it actually cost to rent vs buy in Scarborough right now?<\/h2>\n

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The figures available for August 2026 suggest buying costs more per month than renting in Scarborough, even as home prices sit below where they were a year earlier. Wahi’s Scarborough market data<\/a>, checked in August 2026, lists a median sold price of $920,000 for detached homes and $507,750 for condos of any size, down 12.0% and 4.4% year-over-year respectively, with townhouses at $786,500, down 6.5%.<\/p>\n

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Current Scarborough home prices by property type<\/h3>\n

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The table below breaks down where prices sit for each property type, along with the rough monthly rent a comparable unit would need to charge before renting stops being the cheaper option, using the five percent rule explained further down.<\/p>\n

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Property type<\/strong><\/td>Median sold price (checked Aug. 2026)<\/strong><\/td>Year-over-year change<\/strong><\/td>Rough monthly break-even rent*<\/strong><\/td><\/tr><\/thead>
Condo<\/td>$507,750<\/td>down 4.4%<\/td>about $2,116<\/td><\/tr>
Townhouse<\/td>$786,500<\/td>down 6.5%<\/td>about $3,277<\/td><\/tr>
Detached<\/td>$920,000<\/td>down 12.0%<\/td>about $3,833<\/td><\/tr><\/tbody><\/table><\/figure>\n

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*Break-even rent uses the five percent rule: price multiplied by five percent, divided by 12, rounded to the nearest dollar. Purchase prices are medians across all sizes within each property type; rent figures cited elsewhere in this article are one-bedroom-specific unless noted. Prices: Wahi, checked August 2026.<\/em><\/p>\n

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How rents compare across the city right now<\/h3>\n

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liv.rent’s own August 2026 Ontario rent report<\/a> tracks asking rents across 20 Ontario areas each month. The City of Toronto’s overall unfurnished one-bedroom average asking rent was $1,947 in August 2026, down 5.99% from $2,071 a year earlier, and Scarborough itself showed a month-over-month decline in unfurnished one-bedroom rents in the same report, even as furnished one-bedroom rents in the neighbourhood ticked up over the same period. Among the 20 areas the report tracks, Oakville asked the most for an unfurnished one-bedroom in August, at $2,172, while London was the most affordable, at $1,547. Both figures sit below the roughly $2,116 monthly break-even point produced by a $507,750 Scarborough condo under the five percent rule. That comparison isn’t quite like-for-like: the condo figure covers Scarborough condos of any size, while the rent figures are city-wide and specific to one-bedroom units. Even accounting for that gap, the available figures suggest renting may have lower short-term costs for many one-bedroom renters in the region.<\/p>\n

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At federally regulated lenders, borrowers generally need to qualify at the higher of 5.25% or their contract rate plus two percentage points, a minimum qualifying rate<\/a> the Office of the Superintendent of Financial Institutions has held since 2021 and the Department of Finance reaffirms annually. That buffer, combined with property tax, condo fees, and maintenance, is a big part of why a lower purchase price doesn’t automatically make owning cheaper month to month.<\/p>\n

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How do Ontario’s rental laws shape the buy vs rent decision in Scarborough?<\/h2>\n

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These protections apply specifically in Ontario, home to Scarborough, and don’t automatically extend to tenancy law elsewhere in Canada. Units first occupied for residential purposes on or before November 15, 2018 fall under Ontario’s 2026 rent increase guideline<\/a> of 2.1%. Units first occupied after that date are exempt from the guideline amount: a landlord can raise rent above it, but still needs to give at least 90 days’ written notice on the correct form and must wait at least 12 months between increases.<\/p>\n

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Deposits work differently here too. Ontario law doesn’t allow a landlord to collect a security or damage deposit at all. The only deposit permitted is a rent deposit, commonly equal to the last month’s rent, capped at one month’s rent, and it can only be applied to the final month of the tenancy, never to repairs, according to the Landlord and Tenant Board’s guide to the Residential Tenancies Act<\/a>.<\/p>\n

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Bill 60, the Fighting Delays, Building Faster Act, 2025<\/a>, is another piece of legislation renters weighing a longer stay should understand, and its provisions are taking effect in stages rather than all at once. One confirmed change: starting September 21, 2026, a landlord ending a tenancy for their own use, a purchaser’s use, or a qualifying family member’s use will no longer be required to provide a month’s compensation or offer an alternate unit, provided they give the tenant at least 120 days’ notice on an N12 form.<\/p>\n

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An earlier version of the bill also proposed consulting on ending the rule<\/a> that a fixed-term lease continues on a month-to-month basis, on the same terms, once the term ends. The Ontario government dropped that specific proposal in late October 2025 after pushback from tenant advocates, so the long-standing month-to-month conversion rule remains in place. This is general information about Ontario’s rules, not legal advice, and a paralegal or tenant duty counsel can speak to a specific situation.<\/p>\n

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What is the Scarborough housing market doing in 2026, and does it favour buyers or renters?<\/h2>\n

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Ontario is the only province CMHC’s 2026 Housing Market Outlook<\/a> expects to see home prices decline in 2026, a call the agency ties to a large resale inventory, affordability constraints, and weaker sales, with a recovery not expected until 2027. That province-wide softness shows up locally: Scarborough’s detached, condo, and townhouse prices are all down year over year, as the price table above shows.<\/p>\n

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Rental supply has grown too. Across the Greater Toronto Area’s condominium apartment rental market specifically, TRREB reported 20,264 rental listings<\/a> in the fourth quarter of 2025, up 8.5% year-over-year. More condo rental listings are one factor that may have contributed to softer asking rents through 2026, though it isn’t the only one. Renters who want to see what that softer market looks like unit by unit can search current Scarborough rentals on liv.rent<\/a>.<\/p>\n

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How does the Scarborough Subway Extension change the buy vs. rent equation?<\/h2>\n

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The Scarborough Subway Extension will extend TTC Line 2 by 7.8 kilometres from Kennedy Station to Sheppard Avenue and McCowan Road, adding three new stations. The project’s cost has climbed to $10.2 billion<\/a> after new construction contracts were signed, and the extension is expected to put 38,000 more people within walking distance<\/a> of rapid transit once complete.<\/p>\n

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Construction has moved forward on the ground: Ontario and the federal government marked another construction milestone for the project on July 31, 2026, following the ceremonial groundbreaking on the line’s first station in 2025.<\/p>\n

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The timeline is less certain. Secondary reporting, including a BlogTO report in May 2026<\/a> citing internal TTC documents, has suggested the extension could open as late as 2033, three years after the original 2030 target, though an official project schedule hasn’t confirmed that date. For anyone buying near the future McCowan corridor on the assumption of transit-driven appreciation, even the possibility of a multi-year delay is worth factoring in.<\/p>\n

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In the meantime, the TTC says the Scarborough Busway<\/a>, a four-kilometre dedicated bus corridor between Kennedy and Ellesmere stations continuing toward Scarborough Town Centre, is on track to open September 30, 2026, with Kennedy-to-Scarborough Centre trips expected to take about 15 minutes. For renters, a longer subway timeline is arguably good news: it stretches the window to save a down payment while living near future stations at prices that don’t yet fully reflect a transit premium.<\/p>\n

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What does the five percent rule say about buying vs renting in Scarborough today?<\/h2>\n

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A quick way real estate analysts screen a buy-versus-rent decision is the five percent rule: multiply a home’s price by five percent, then divide by 12, to get the rough monthly rent a comparable property would need to charge before renting stops being the better financial move.<\/p>\n

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Applied to Scarborough’s current price points, a $507,750 condo produces a rough break-even rent of about $2,116 a month, a $786,500 townhouse about $3,277, and a $920,000 detached home about $3,833. These purchase prices are medians across condos, townhouses, and detached homes of any size, while the closest available rent figure, the City of Toronto’s unfurnished one-bedroom average of $1,947 in August 2026, is both city-wide and specific to one bedroom. With that caveat in mind, and with Scarborough showing a month-over-month rent decline in the same report, the available figures suggest renting may have lower short-term costs than a $507,750 condo purchase. liv.rent’s report doesn’t track a matching two- or three-bedroom figure for Scarborough specifically, so the townhouse and detached break-even numbers above are best read as reference points rather than a direct rent comparison.<\/p>\n

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The rule leaves a few things out. It doesn’t credit a buyer for the equity built through principal paydown, and it doesn’t count a maintenance reserve, which some buyers budget at roughly 1% of a property’s value per year as a rough planning assumption, or the opportunity cost of tying up a down payment instead of investing it elsewhere. Renters holding a pre-2018 unit have a further advantage the five percent rule doesn’t capture at all: a rent increase capped at 2.1% a year, a protection covered in more detail in liv.rent’s rental laws coverage<\/a>.<\/p>\n

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What are the real hidden costs of buying in Scarborough that renters often overlook?<\/h2>\n

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Buying in Scarborough, part of the City of Toronto, means paying both Ontario’s provincial land transfer tax<\/a> and the city’s municipal land transfer tax<\/a>. On a $507,750 purchase, the two combined come to approximately $12,860 before any rebate, split roughly evenly between the provincial and municipal portions.<\/p>\n

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Eligible first-time buyers can receive rebates against some of that tax: Ontario offers a rebate of up to $4,000<\/a>, and Toronto offers a further rebate of up to $4,475<\/a>, though neither eliminates the tax outright at Scarborough’s current price points.<\/p>\n

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Financing adds more. Because a Scarborough condo at $507,750 falls in the price band above $500,000, CMHC’s minimum down payment rule<\/a> requires 5% on the first $500,000 and 10% on the remainder, for a minimum of $25,775, just over 5% of the purchase price rather than a flat 5%. That leaves a base loan of $481,975, and because the down payment is just over 5% and under 10% of the purchase price, CMHC’s highest standard premium tier of 4% applies, adding roughly $19,279 in mortgage insurance premium before any applicable provincial sales tax.<\/p>\n

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Add legal fees and a home inspection, and a Scarborough condo buyer is realistically looking at several thousand dollars more before closing, on top of the down payment and land transfer tax. A renter moving into a comparable Scarborough one-bedroom, by contrast, typically needs only first month’s rent plus a last-month rent deposit upfront: no land transfer tax, no mortgage insurance, and no closing costs. Using the City of Toronto’s $1,947 average unfurnished one-bedroom asking rent from liv.rent’s August 2026 report<\/a>, that comes to roughly $3,894 to move in.<\/p>\n

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When does buying in Scarborough make more sense than renting?<\/h2>\n

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None of this means buying is the wrong move for everyone. Ownership tends to make more sense once a buyer plans to stay long enough to absorb the land transfer tax, mortgage insurance premium, and other closing costs through equity growth and avoided rent increases, often several years or more. It also depends on qualifying comfortably at the stress-tested rate described above, and having the $25,775 minimum down payment plus roughly $12,860 in land transfer tax, before rebates, ready to go.<\/p>\n

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For a shorter timeline, or a smaller down payment, the numbers in this guide point the other way. The table below sums up which side of that line a given renter is likely to fall on.<\/p>\n

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Buying may suit you if…<\/strong><\/td>Renting may suit you if…<\/strong><\/td><\/tr><\/thead>
You plan to stay in the GTA for several years or more<\/td>You might move within the next one to three years<\/td><\/tr>
You can comfortably clear the stress-tested qualifying rate<\/td>You’re still saving toward a down payment<\/td><\/tr>
You have the minimum down payment plus closing costs ready<\/td>You value flexibility over building equity right now<\/td><\/tr>
Your unit was first occupied for residential purposes after November 15, 2018, so it’s exempt from Ontario’s rent increase guideline<\/td>Your unit is protected by the 2.1% guideline<\/td><\/tr><\/tbody><\/table><\/figure>\n

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Whichever side of that table describes your situation today, the trade-off is worth revisiting every year or two, since prices, rent, and rules in Scarborough are all still moving. This is general information about market conditions, not financial or legal advice, and a mortgage broker, financial planner, or paralegal can weigh in on a specific situation. If you decide renting is the better fit for now, you can search current Scarborough listings on liv.rent<\/a> and use platform tools like digital applications and verified landlord information where available.<\/p>\n

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What is the average rent in Scarborough, Ontario, in 2026?<\/h2>\t\t\t\t
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liv.rent’s own market data doesn’t isolate a single Scarborough-only dollar figure, but the neighbourhood showed a month-over-month decline in unfurnished one-bedroom asking rents in August 2026, tracking below the City of Toronto’s overall unfurnished one-bedroom average of $1,947 that month, itself down 5.99% from $2,071 a year earlier, per liv.rent’s August 2026 Ontario rent report.<\/p>\n\n\t\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t<\/section>\n\t\t\t\t\n\t\t\t\t

What is the average home price in Scarborough in 2026?<\/h2>\t\t\t\t
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Wahi’s Scarborough market data, checked in August 2026, lists a median sold price of $920,000 for detached homes, down 12.0% year-over-year, $507,750 for condos of any size, down 4.4%, and $786,500 for townhouses, down 6.5%.<\/p>\n\n\t\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t<\/section>\n\t\t\t\t\n\t\t\t\t

Is Scarborough rent controlled in 2026?<\/h2>\t\t\t\t
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It depends on when the unit was first occupied for residential purposes. Units first occupied on or before November 15, 2018 fall under Ontario’s 2026 rent increase guideline of 2.1%. Units first occupied after that date are exempt from the guideline amount; a landlord can raise rent above it, but still needs to give at least 90 days’ written notice and must wait at least 12 months between increases.<\/p>\n\n\t\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t<\/section>\n\t\t\t\t\n\t\t\t\t

What did Bill 60 change for Ontario renters in 2026?<\/h2>\t\t\t\t
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Bill 60, the Fighting Delays, Building Faster Act, 2025, passed in late 2025 and amends parts of the Residential Tenancies Act, with provisions taking effect in stages. One confirmed change, scheduled to take effect September 21, 2026: a landlord ending a tenancy for their own use, a purchaser’s use, or a qualifying family member’s use will no longer have to provide a month’s compensation or an alternate unit, provided they give at least 120 days’ notice. An earlier proposal to end automatic month-to-month lease conversions was dropped before the bill passed. This is general information, not legal advice.<\/p>\n\n\t\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t<\/section>\n\t\t\t\t\n\t\t\t\t

When will the Scarborough Subway Extension open, and does it matter for buying vs renting?<\/h2>\t\t\t\t
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The original target was 2030. Secondary reporting has suggested the extension could open as late as 2033, though the official opening date should be confirmed with the TTC or Metrolinx. Either way, buyers near a future station on the assumption of transit-driven appreciation should plan for the possibility of a longer wait.<\/p>\n\n\t\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t<\/section>\n\t\t\t\t\n\t\t\t\t

Can a landlord in Ontario charge a damage deposit or security deposit?<\/h2>\t\t\t\t
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No. Ontario law doesn’t allow a separate security or damage deposit. A landlord may collect a rent deposit, commonly equal to the last month’s rent, capped at one month’s rent, and it can only go toward the final month of the tenancy, never repairs.<\/p>\n\n\t\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t<\/section>\n\t\t\t\t\n\t\t\t\t

Is it cheaper to rent or buy a condo in Scarborough right now?<\/h2>\t\t\t\t
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Using the five percent rule, a $507,750 Scarborough condo, a median across condos of any size, produces a rough break-even rent of about $2,116 a month. The closest available rent figure, the City of Toronto’s overall one-bedroom average of $1,947, sits below that line, and Scarborough itself trended lower still in August 2026. The comparison isn’t fully like-for-like, but the available figures suggest renting may have lower short-term costs for many one-bedroom renters right now.<\/p>\n\n\t\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t<\/section>\n\t\t\t\t\n\t\t\t\t

What are the upfront costs of buying in Scarborough vs renting?<\/h2>\t\t\t\t
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A $507,750 Scarborough condo requires a minimum down payment of $25,775 under CMHC’s tiered rule, plus roughly $12,860 in combined Ontario and Toronto land transfer tax before rebates, plus mortgage insurance, legal fees, and a home inspection. A renter moving into a comparable unit typically needs only first month’s rent plus a last-month rent deposit, which comes to about $3,894 using the City of Toronto’s average one-bedroom asking rent from liv.rent’s August 2026 report.<\/p>\n\n\t\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t<\/section>\n\t\t\n