What net worth actually measures
Net worth is the simplest scoreboard in personal finance: everything you own at market value, minus everything you owe. Statistics Canada tracks it through the Survey of Financial Security every three or four years and uses the medians to set the national benchmarks financial planners reference.
How Canadians stack up by age
Per the 2023 Survey of Financial Security, Canadian household median net worth runs roughly $30k under age 35, $280k between 35 and 44, $520k between 45 and 54, $770k between 55 and 64, and around $725k for the 65+ retirement-decumulation cohort. Means run substantially higher than medians because the top decile pulls the average up. Don’t mistake mean-net-worth headlines for the typical household.
What to use as the home value
Use a defensible market estimate, not the original purchase price. The municipal assessment (MPAC in Ontario, BC Assessment in BC, equivalents elsewhere) is a reasonable lower bound. A realtor’s comparative market analysis or a recent appraisal is more current. Public sale-comparable tools like House Sigma, Zealty or HouseSigma help triangulate. Do not include speculative renovation gains.
Pensions: include with care
Defined-contribution pensions, group RRSPs, and TFSAs/RRSPs all have clean current balances. Defined-benefit pensions are harder — their commuted value depends on actuarial assumptions about future earnings, retirement age, indexation, and discount rates. If you want to include one, request a statement of commuted value from your plan administrator. Otherwise, exclude it and treat your DB pension as a separate income stream when modelling retirement readiness.