Plenty also intend to buy in Canada after offloading their US property
More than half of Canadians who own residential property in the United States are considering selling within the next year, with political concerns driving most of these decisions, according to a new Royal LePage survey.
The survey of 2,500 Canadian adults found that 54% of Canadian property owners south of the border plan to sell their homes within 12 months. Among these potential sellers, 62% cited concerns about the current US political administration as their primary motivation.
Many Canadians selling their US properties plan to reinvest domestically. The survey found that 32% of those who have recently sold, or plan to sell within the next year, intend to put their proceeds into the Canadian real estate market.
“The polarizing political climate in the United States is prompting many Canadians to reconsider how and where they spend their time and money,” said Phil Soper, president and CEO of Royal LePage. “Canadians have been the most important foreign investors in America’s residential real estate market for years, and a significant wave of property sales would leave a noticeable mark on the regional economies that snowbirds support.”
The trend extends beyond future sales. Among Canadians who sold US properties in the past year, 44% attributed their decision to the current political administration, while 27% cited personal reasons and 22% pointed to increasingly extreme weather conditions.
The shift reflects broader changes in Canadian travel patterns. Statistics Canada reported that Canadian residents made 6.1 million trips to the US in the first quarter of 2025, a 10.8% decline from the same period in 2024. Spending during these visits also dropped 7.9% year-over-year to $5.7 billion.
“Across sectors, Canadians are increasingly choosing to support domestic businesses, prioritize homegrown products, and invest in their own communities,” Soper explained. “This mindset extends into real estate.”
The political uncertainty has also generated interest from Americans looking north. Web traffic to royallepage.ca from US visitors has surged during key political events. In June 2025, following widespread protests in Los Angeles after ICE raids, US-based traffic jumped 116 % year-over-year.
Similar spikes occurred after the 2024 presidential election, when traffic from American users increased 52% the day after Donald Trump’s victory, and during the first presidential debate between Joe Biden and Trump, when weekly traffic rose 112%.
The National Association of Realtors has noted that Canadians remain among the top two foreign investors in US real estate, though transactions have declined significantly in recent years compared to the 2010s.
The survey was conducted between August 4 and 9, 2025, with age, gender and regional weighting applied to ensure national representation according to 2021 census figures.
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