Most Canadians are paying more for home and auto insurance, and the pressures behind those increases are showing up not only in household budgets but also in claims and regulatory data, Global News reported, citing data from a new Rates.ca report.
Three in four Canadians (75%) with at least one insurance policy on a home, apartment, condo and/or vehicle said their insurance premiums across all lines have increased over the past two years. The proportion is higher among Canadians over 35 years old, at 78%, compared with 64% of those aged 18 to 34.
Meanwhile, nearly two-thirds (63%) of insured respondents said they took steps to lower their insurance costs. Those actions included shopping around (40%), asking for discounts (30%) and changing or removing parts of their coverage (21%).
The report found that home insurance costs rose steadily from 2022 to 2025 across six Ontario cities — Toronto, Hamilton, Oshawa, Windsor, London and Ottawa — with the sharpest increases in 2024 before easing somewhat in 2025.
Severe weather, such as including wildfires, floods and convective storms, remains a major driver. Insurers are facing higher catastrophe losses and more expensive reinsurance, which are feeding into primary property rates. Industry tallies show that severe-weather losses in Canada reached record levels in 2024, nearly triple the 2023 total and many times the averages seen in the early 2000s.
At the same time, home insurers are dealing with elevated rebuilding and repair costs. Prices for materials, skilled trades and code‑compliant rebuilding have risen since the pandemic, even as some supply chain bottlenecks have eased. Trade frictions and global supply chain issues have contributed to higher input costs for North American construction, pushing claim severities up and putting further pressure on home insurance pricing.
Rates.ca’s analysis notes that in Ontario, home and auto combined now account for roughly 4% of after‑tax income on average, with Toronto households paying close to $6,000 a year.
Local data in the report showed auto insurance premiums have been rising especially quickly and now account for most of the typical household’s insurance spend in many urban markets.
In Toronto, the average auto premium increased from $3,453 to $3,997 between 2022 and 2025 and now makes up about 70% of the city’s average household insurance costs, according to the analysis. Across the six Ontario cities, auto insurance consistently represents between 60% and 70% of total household insurance premiums.
Province‑wide figures from the Financial Services Regulatory Authority of Ontario (FSRA) put the average annual Ontario private passenger premium at just over $2,100 as of mid‑2025, with Toronto significantly above that level.
The cost of repairing vehicles is another central driver. Since 2022, repair bills have climbed due to labor shortages in the collision sector, higher technician wages, more complex vehicle technology and ongoing parts delays linked to global supply chain disruptions. Personal auto rate filings across Canada show year‑over‑year premium increases in every province, with Ontario’s average auto rate up several percentage points in the first half of 2025 compared with a year earlier.
“If insurance companies have to pay more money than anticipated … premiums will go up,” said Daniel Ivans, a Rates.ca insurance expert and licensed insurance broker.
Every stage of a repair — diagnostics, parts and labor — costs more than it did a few years ago, Ivans said. “As incomes inflate, the cost of living, goods, parts, and labour inflate. Insurance premiums have to match the cost of losses,” he added.
The kind of car a consumer buys is also playing a bigger role in the premium they are quoted, particularly given Canada’s ongoing auto theft problem and the growing number of tech‑heavy, expensive‑to‑repair models on the road.
Nationally, auto theft losses have surpassed $1 billion annually in recent years, with certain SUVs and pickups — including the Honda CR‑V and Civic — appearing regularly on “most stolen” lists and attracting more intense underwriting scrutiny. In some markets and programs, high‑theft models now face surcharges, coverage restrictions or mandatory anti‑theft devices as conditions of coverage.
Dan Park, CEO of Clutch Canada, an online platform for buying and selling pre‑owned vehicles, said “fancier” cars can be more attractive to thieves and more costly to repair or replace if they are damaged or stolen.
“We’ve had customers cancel purchases on CR‑Vs and Civics specifically because their premiums spiked when they quoted a high‑theft model,” Park said.
The Rates.ca findings come as affordability is moving higher on the agenda for regulators and governments. Statistics Canada data showed that average insurance premiums across all types rose by more than 20% between late 2019 and late 2024. Industry loss trends and recent rate filings suggested further upward pressure in 2025, particularly in high‑risk regions and segments.
Regulators such as FSRA in Ontario and the Alberta Automobile Insurance Rate Board have signaled closer scrutiny of rate adequacy, territorial rating, high‑theft surcharges and the balance between consumer protection and insurer solvency.
Against that backdrop, the survey’s finding that 63% of insured Canadians are shopping around, adjusting coverage or actively seeking discounts underscores the need for clear communication on pricing drivers and for product design that can help manage costs. The combination of climate‑driven property losses, auto claims inflation, theft and regulatory oversight suggests that premium pressure is unlikely to ease quickly, even as carriers invest in analytics and risk‑prevention tools to keep coverage sustainable and affordable over the longer term.
