The threshold every buyer has to meet to own a home ― the minimum down payment ― has reached Canada’s highest level on record, a new report says.

With house prices rising at their fastest pace in 11 years, it would take a median-earning household 60 months to save up a minimum down payment on a house today, according to National Bank of Canada’s latest housing affordability monitor.

That’s the longest it has been in 40 years of home-affordability records, topping the previous peak at the height of the 1990 housing bubble.

“At a national level, there has never been a worse time to accumulate the minimum down payment,” economists Kyle Dahms and Camille Baillargeon wrote. 

National Bank’s estimates assume a 10-per-cent savings rate, and a 6-per-cent down payment.

Broken down by city, famously unaffordable Vancouver takes top spot for the country’s least accessible housing market. At the median household income, it takes 58 months to save up for a condo down payment there, or 409 months for a detached home ― roughly 34 years.

In Toronto, it would take 51 months to save up for a condo or 289 months (roughly 24 years) for a detached house. Contrast that with Edmonton, where a condo takes 15 months and a detached home 28 months.