Survey Who we are As befitting a community, we snowbirds have a lot in common with each other. Most of us (68%) are over the age of 70 – as a group, we seem to be living longer, a trend which we’ve noted over the many years that we’ve been compiling our survey data. The vast majority of us are married (79%) and 9% are widows or widowers. Nearly all of us were born in Canada (88%) and speak English as our first language (94%). Those who weren’t born in the Great White North come from a variety of places, including Western Europe (48%), the United States (11%), Eastern Europe (6%) and a smattering of other countries around the world. As a whole, we’re pretty well-educated: about 60% of us have either an undergraduate, graduate or professional degree, while an additional 19% report that they attended college for at least a short period of time. Where we live and where we travel During the summer months, fully half of us call Ontario home (50%), but a growing portion of our population hails from Western Canada (B.C. 12%; Alberta 18%; Saskatchewan and Manitoba 10%). An overwhelming majority of us own the homes and condominiums in which we live (90%). And the vast majority of those homes are not in a dedicated retirement or 50-plus community (87%). During winter, it’s a bit of a different story: only 57% of us own our home-away-from-home (either a house or a condo), with the remainder choosing to rent (15%), go RVing (6%), stay with friends (2%) or choose some other arrangement. Unlike back home, the number of us living in a 50-plus community during the winter (45%) is almost equal to the number who don’t (42%). When we get away from the cold, most of us are heading for the U.S. Sunbelt – Florida (46%) and Arizona (25%) being by far the most popular destinations, with California, Texas and Hawaii collectively accounting for another 13%. The rest of us are attracted to a variety of other places including Mexico, the Caribbean and Southern Europe. A very small number of us (3%) aren’t tied down to any one place, instead choosing to move around to various locations during the winter. When we go, just under half of us (49%) typically stay for five or six months and a sizable chunk spends three to four months (27%). Not surprisingly, the vast majority of us (73%) host our family and friends at our winter destination while we’re there. CSANews | FALL 2025 | 33
RkJQdWJsaXNoZXIy MzMzNzMx