Sadly, none of these solutions will do anything for lower-income people who are in the most dire need of housing. Those people need help right now, not years down the road.
This is actually where the Liberals started, pre-Covid, with the 2017 National Housing Strategy: $15 billion in new money for non-market housing for lower-income households. At $500,000 per home, that's funding for roughly 30,000 homes.
Post-Covid, though, with the giant surge in remote work and people needing more space at home, plus pandemic savings flooding into the housing market and the Bank of Canada hiking interest rates to cool down the economy, it's not just lower-income people. We need a truly massive amount of housing: CMHC estimates something like 3.5 million homes over 10 years, on top of business as usual. As Mike Moffatt says, this is a generational challenge, comparable to the immediate postwar period, or the 1960s when the Baby Boomers moved out on their own.
And we need a lot more market housing, not just non-market housing: In the heyday of public housing, back in the late 1970s and 1980s, the average was about 16,000 homes per year. We need much, much more than that.
Thanks for this, Steve. It's awfully refreshing to read something positive--and true--rather than endless carping about the dreadfulness of everything. And for all those unable to identify a ray of hope, listen: the perfect is the enemy of the good. It is not possible to solve all the problems everywhere all at once for everybody and fixating on that is paralytic. One starts by starting and hopes the unintended consequences are positive more often than not.
But if it takes (probably much) more than a decade, and is this incremental - I really don't see how this would save a generation in a truly dire situation, right now. If this scenario plays out, a large part (and in many cases, a crucial part) of their adult life will have passed, with only marginal improvements on the horizon.
I really, truly, wanted this to cheer me up! Gawd damn it, not even the hopeful view is even that hope-filled.
Literally. Even if millennials (most of whom don't reasonably have a decade to wait to start families if they want them) were willing to deal with having young children in sub-standard conditions in an expectation things will get better, there's no reason anyone would have enough trust to take that leap. It took a real crisis, rather than 'just' a long decline in prospects, for the problem to be taken even remotely seriously by politicians. There's still little evidence governments will prioritize housing affordability if it means stepping on the toes of older Canadians in ways that go beyond the inconvenience of changing neighbourhoods and upzoning (which often even improves the value of existing SFH). What happens if there's not a win-win situation with the capacity (or money) to build housing and the population growth needed to give an aging population what they believe they were promised? No one's going to risk having a kid in their childhood bedroom with odds like that!
Not only will a large part of their adult life have passed; but a large part of their home equity building years will have paid their equity to rent. We have to build smaller starter units that are affordable, and efficiently and aesthetically designed, so that equity can be accumulated. That gives the future option to use equity to move up to bigger units, in lower interest rate cycles, as the family and its finances grow. Choices are inflations enemy.
If you are lucky enough to inherit, and can afford the tax hit, great. But who wants to wait to inherit? That is an artificial cycle interfering with the child bearing years.
We don't all need to live in big cities anymore. Canada is huge. It has lots of crown land. What is wrong with starting new towns from scratch, or growing our smaller ones, if they are affordable Volkswagens? We don't need Lamborghinis. That would take pressure off cities wouldn't it? The history of Israeli kibbutzim has some tips - good and bad.
I'm not even sure that we need to mention small towns, we need very desirable places to live anywhere other than southwestern BC, southern Ontario, Calgary, or Halifax.
People really like living in those cities, sometimes for obvious reasons, and we can't force people not to move there. I think it's a mix of liberalizing growth in those cities (as Steve outlined) and incentivizing jobs and culture in other areas - whether through government investment, lower land taxes, etc.
I get exactly what you are saying Jasper; but I hope you are not implying that small towns are not in the very desirable category. The small town where I live - area is a better term - is so desirable that we have growth issues that are changing the area's character.
Of course I agree that we can't force any law abiding person to move anywhere and can only incentivize them; but do we want to polarize cities and small towns from each other and internally by personal wealth? It can't possibly be a good thing if only people with means flock to cities and live well there, while job seekers flock there out of necessity to survive but possibly not thrive. Ditto for the homeless. Ditto for the addicts.
You said a word that needs to be said...."CROWN LAND" We have thousands and thousands of acres of crown land all across Canada. Why do we not start new towns from scratch? Why are we restricted from building needed housing on crown land? Why can't the people utilize Crown Land??
Crown land close to existing larger population centres is often set aside as parks or nature preserves, and those should stay that way. If government releases crown land for housing it will prefer to do so near existing infrastructure: roads, sewers, water systems, schools, hospitals, ambulance and fire and police services, etc. for speed of development, cost efficiency and job availability.
If an existing small town has suitable releasable crown land adjacent to it then that is likely the more practical and logical option. Building new towns from scratch is risky because people may decide they don’t want to live there and then we have a white elephant. It is doable with precise planning. Some have already postulated that there aren’t enough construction workers to build the needed inventory of housing let alone the infrastructure needed for a new from scratch town. There are solutions to that. Let highschool students who are itching to go to work and make good construction money do so. They can always go back for higher education with mature entry after the building boom settles.They may even be better students then. Modularize the buildings for assembly line efficiency; but individualize the facades and the landscaping. A new from scratch town can be put on wells (individual or shared) and septic systems rather than piped water and sewers. We may regret that in the future or we may be pleasantly pleased by the bigger lot size required and its accompanying provision of natural surroundings that are an extension of the smaller homes we will build on those lots. The digital age gives us a lot of flexibility with respect to the employment issues. People buying into from scratch towns will have to be more self-reliant and patient until services catch up.
I’m just throwing out ideas and am willing to be torn apart for them. We need solutions.
To oversimplify, people move where the jobs are. That's why people are cramming into the GTA, Montreal, and Metro Vancouver. (And why so many people are moving to Edmonton and Calgary.) There's plenty of housing in Tumbler Ridge, because there's few jobs.
Thing is, what Montreal and Edmonton have, that Toronto and Vancouver do not, is an "elastic housing supply." When people move there and prices start to go up, other people build more housing, keeping prices stable. That doesn't happen in Toronto and Vancouver, because you have high demand colliding with a slow, discretionary, revenue-maximizing municipal approval process. That's Poilievre's diagnosis, and the events of the last four weeks show that Sean Fraser and the Liberals both accept the diagnosis and are acting on it. https://morehousing.ca/cmhc-wedge
I live 200 km northeast of Toronto. This area is fast growing and desireable; but it has always been boom and bust here.
What floored me on Sunday was the admission by a service technician who came all the way from Toronto that he had given up on Toronto and was thinking of moving his family back to China after ten years in Canada because he works all the time and fears he will never be able to buy. He is where the jobs are; but ....
Yeah, when housing is scarce and expensive, your real wages are lower. In other words, high housing costs are making us poorer. I'm somewhat surprised that he would rather move his family back to China than to move somewhere like Calgary or Edmonton.
I'm glad we're getting to Liberal/Conservative consensus on the need for more housing, and on municipal gatekeepers as a key bottleneck. I particularly like the National Housing Accord proposal: https://morehousing.ca/national-housing-accord
Thanks for the link Russil. I skimmed through quickly and will need more time to digest your article.
I’m originally from a communist country; so I was also surprised that he would consider China as his option. We talked at length. I suggested Calgary and Edmonton where I used to live. He has friends in Yellowknife, where I have a relative. The cold scared him off and he wouldn’t believe me that the damp Toronto cold is more unpleasant to me than a much lower temperature dry cold. It is important to mention that for every suggestion I made he asked: “Are there Chinese there?”
When my dad and I came to Canada we slept in one bed in a room with a fridge and a hotplate. Eventually my dad saved enough to buy a war time house mortgage free (No telephone, no TV, no car, laundry at the coin laundry, ironed my jeans by putting them under the mattress, grocery shopping with my little red wagon that I hoped my friends wouldn’t see me with.) That isn’t possible anymore. I am not sharing this to preach, rather to point out that we once built a mass of war time houses in quick and cheap time. They are recognizable in all cities and most towns I have been to by the roof having absolutely minimal overhang to save on material. They were and are solid. We can do that again with will.
"Why do we not start new towns from scratch?" Well, Jane, as the saying goes, it's complicated.
First you need to find the particular land; even if a particular government has land in the "right" place it is quite a chore to tell folks that it will be used for Newtown A, instead of whatever we had thought previously. You know, appeals, demonstrations, vested interests, etc. Then, you need to find the money. Oh, sure, governments can borrow - see the federal balance sheet, not to mention the provinces, to see how much borrowing capacity they have.
Then you need to get the planning process done. Did we say this was quick? Nope! The bureaucrats will claim to need to "refine" the vision; public hearings; appeals; written plans (that will be ignored); etc., etc. Then we need to get contractors in to dig and construct roads, sewers, electrical, phone lines, etc., etc. Then we need to get home builders in to build the houses, apartments, etc. Then, then, then, then ....
Oh, and yeah, we need to build schools, fire halls, get a new municipality up and running, etc., etc.
All of those things can be done. Certainly it takes time but that time can be much compressed with real political will. Oh, that last is the critical missing piece!
So ...... it is a good idea but I don't see Canada - and, in particular, the various levels of government in Canada - moving at all quickly; experience tells me that. So, another good idea that Canada simply allows to float by without grabbing it.
Call me cynical but when you do call me cynical please also call me a realist.
The Calgary letter, where Sean Fraser said that he would not approve Housing Accelerator funding if council rejected its own task force recommendations again, was particularly eye-opening. Followed by the letter to Halifax, saying that they needed to allow four storeys everywhere: in Vancouver, pro-housing people are watching with great interest.
I thought what you said on Twitter captured it perfectly: Fraser is using the Housing Accelerator carrot as a stick. The Liberals are stealing Poilievre's ideas and outbidding him. Poilievre is promising $100M in bonus funding to municipalities; Fraser has 40X as much in the Housing Accelerator Fund. Poilievre is promising to remove the GST on new rental housing that's below-market, requiring some kind of evaluation process to decide whether each project is sufficiently affordable; the Liberals have already removed it on all new rental housing.
The letter was a stunt. Zoning has never held up housing supply in Calgary. The bottleneck is labor. Despite record immigration levels based on an alleged point based system, Canada can't seem to let in enough construction workers.
Doesn't Calgary need to start allowing more infill housing? I thought that was one of the most important recommendations of the housing affordability task force. https://morehousing.ca/calgary-task-force
In Vancouver, there's a lot of construction workers who are replacing old single-detached houses with new single-detached houses. If they were allowed to build multifamily housing instead (like townhouses or small apartment buildings), that would help.
Calgary probably has enough already approved infill sites to accommodate 100k+ in fills. Ontario and BC problems don't always apply in other parts of the country. Calgary has a ring of underdeveloped land around dt, much of which was former industrial or already demolished detached housing. An artifact of a boom and bust economiy is that ambitious plans demolish old buildings for new projects that don't get built. Think of Calgary as Vancouver in the 80s before Yaletown or Coal Harbor started, but with much of the land already cleared and remediated. The Beltline, East Village, Chinatown, Eau Claire, Sunalta, Bankview, Lower Mount Royal and Mission have plenty of available sites. In addition, many inner ring suburbs already have approved area redevelopment plans allowing densification that passed in the 80s and 90s during the Klein and Duerr years. Add to that large infill projects in the University District, Westbrook, Currie and Quarry Park.
I typically agree with everything that Steve says on housing policy. It does seem like the people that matter are coming around to the fact that land and land-use are the primary drivers of the housing crisis. Thanks for providing a round-up of the most relevant progress municipally.
We are going to bulldoze so much heritage and farms for the sake of catching up on building homes. We need to build. Can't we manage the need to build? No, this is Canada, we cannot because of petty fights, the rush to please and the need to stay relevant. My country is an embarassment.
The numbers are bad... housing completions are flat over multiple decades while we're bringing in more immigrants than ever to fill that limited space. Supposedly there is reason for optimism because the political rhetoric has shifted?
How does this affect the disconnect in the numbers? Homebuilding is at capacity, so will tinkering with zoning regulations will make any difference to our housing shortfall? I don't see how.
In Metro Vancouver, there's a couple big opportunities to make better use of our construction work force. One is that there's a lot of people replacing old single-detached houses with new single-detached houses; they could just as easily be building small apartment buildings instead.
A second is location: the shortage is worst in the city of Vancouver, reflected in prices and rents, because hyperlocal opposition means it's harder to get a 40-storey building approved in Vancouver than an 80-storey building in Burnaby. It's like pushing down on a balloon: scarcity in Vancouver drives up prices and rents in Burnaby and Surrey. https://morehousing.ca/location
We're so fortunate to live in a country where (at least some of the time) opposing parties and jurisdictions challenge eachother rather than antagonize.
When Toronto taxes its empty space as "four units as-of-right" on any lot in the city, two birds will die with one decision...and not be a burden to the rest of Ontario.
Provincial governments can impose rent controls if they had the political will. Provincial governments could outlaw AirBnBs so that all this mostly unused real estate would be available in the market place. There are so many solutions but, of course, it would require political will and the real estate industry to stop their piracy. Many, many realtors enrich themselves at the expense of both sellers and buyers. It's unconscionable.
Nothing destroys a city more effective, besides aerial bombardment, than rent control. It subverts the free market and when you don't have a market where supply is incentivized to meet demand, it just makes things worse for everyone except long term incumbent renters.
As for Airbnb, don't short term residents have the same housing needs as long term residents? Why are visitors less important?
Visitors less important? Are you kidding? If we have a shortage of homes in this country (and I believe we do) why are we concerned about allowing AirBnBs? You and I both know it's a scam. These AirBnbs spend most of the year empty. How ridiculous when we need homes for our young people and newcomers. I want MORE people paying taxes, not less. But of course, you might also think taxes are unnecessary. If that's so, you need to move to Florida. In Canada, most of us consider paying taxes our duty and we expect programs and services in return. Heard of healthcare?
I've heard of Canadian health care. It's mediocre at best to be honest. Nothing to write home about.
As for AirBNBs, why is it that so many have an opinion on what a property owner can do with their own property. Now some folks don't even want to allow a stranger to use their home and private property how they see fit. I know property rights don't exist in Canada but that is just a bit too big brother.
We have a shortage of homes, only quantity of homes matching the population of people who want to live there will fix the problem. Rent controls, occupancy controls, etc. just make the problem worse, all to appease folks who have no clue how the economy works (and their bank accounts show it).
There's rent controls in Vancouver. I'm not aware that it has destroyed Vancouver. As for the free market, that's what has caused the housing problem and resulted in out-of-control real estate prices with no end in sight. The market? My ass. The price of homes in Canada are seriously inflated. It's ridiculous. My home has at least quadrupled in value since I purchased it in 1993. How ridiculous. I consider it immoral that young people and, really, anyone who wishes, cannot afford either rent or to purchase a home. Developers, realtors and all those involved are making money hand over fist. It's out of control, not to mention off-shore home purchases or hedge funds investing in real estate at extortionate rates. Get real! This could all be mitigated if provincial governments had the will.
Alberta has no rent control other than only allowing one increase a year. It is a way more functional real estate market than BC, and it is a market that accepts free market fundamentals. In Edmonton the average family can afford the average home. In Calgary most families can afford homes, even if not in a choice neighborhood.
The free market works fine if you actually allow builders to build and landlords to run their businesses. Perhaps Vancouver could learn that.
Btw, without housing for young families you literally destroy a city, slower than a bomb but no less effective.
Forgot to say, in Vancouver (and probably Toronto) offshore purchases or homes bought as investment properties by hedge funds, etc. are also a huge issue. Shouldn't be allowed when our entire country is short of housing. The "free market" isn't serving us well at all.
Only because zoning subverts the free market. Some places way more than others. Vancouver has famously strict (and classist) zoning regs, therefore only the well to do can afford to buy or build there.
Kind of my point. Developers have a lot of influence as does the real estate industry. City planners and the city councils are often bullied and there is a lot of interference regarding zoning. There's not enough political will. I am pleased to know the federal government is bypassing provincial governments who have shown absolutely no intention of making sure there is affordable housing. I like that the federal government is dealing directly with municipalities. I think this will make a difference. How much difference, I don't know.
I don't think rent controls destroyed Vancouver's real estate market. Predatory realtors and developers have. I also don't agree that families can afford housing in Edmonton or Calgary. Many cannot afford the prices. I agree that not having available housing for young families will destroy a city. Unfortunately that's what's happening all over Canada but mostly in the large cities. There's no need for these prices. They are artificial and being kept that way by the real estate industry. The "free market" isn't working.
I find living in a small town desirable, but I'm pretty sure that statistically Canada is still urbanizing.
I think it's a good reminder for me to think about which group I'm talking about. Very online, highly educated people who talk a lot about the housing crisis tend to want to live in Toronto, Vancouver, and Calgary... and nowhere else (exaggerating obviously), but you're right that that doesn't apply to Canadians as a whole.
...Although it does generally apply to e.g. international students where a lot of population growth is focused.
Two additional things that I thought of after I hit the Post button: where will people work, which you have identified; and, what about transportation from Newtown A to older centers to allow people to got to jobs in that old center?
As one further item, it later, later occurred to me that, yes, there is a lot of Crown land but where is it largely? Why, often in very remote areas so it would be even more difficult to develop. Crown land in closer in areas, such as cities, etc. tends to have been acquired for a specific purpose, e.g. city transit barns, garbage dumps, etc., etc. Frequently cities acquire that land when it is relatively cheaper and before the need it but need it they will so that close in Crown land is not usually a realistic candidate for new housing.
The other (somewhat macabre) part of this is a very big generation of homeowners (Boomers) is aging and will begin leaving this mortal coil over the coming decade or so. The oldest Boomers will turn 80 in 2026, so the following 20 years will likely see a lot of homes become available on market, along with estates shifting to their largely millennial children who have been priced out of the housing market. That won't solve everyone's problem -- not every boomer had a home and not every one of them did well enough to pass on anything to their kids. But, at the market/society level, it should provide some relief in addition to these policy initiatives.
Sadly, none of these solutions will do anything for lower-income people who are in the most dire need of housing. Those people need help right now, not years down the road.
This is actually where the Liberals started, pre-Covid, with the 2017 National Housing Strategy: $15 billion in new money for non-market housing for lower-income households. At $500,000 per home, that's funding for roughly 30,000 homes.
Post-Covid, though, with the giant surge in remote work and people needing more space at home, plus pandemic savings flooding into the housing market and the Bank of Canada hiking interest rates to cool down the economy, it's not just lower-income people. We need a truly massive amount of housing: CMHC estimates something like 3.5 million homes over 10 years, on top of business as usual. As Mike Moffatt says, this is a generational challenge, comparable to the immediate postwar period, or the 1960s when the Baby Boomers moved out on their own.
And we need a lot more market housing, not just non-market housing: In the heyday of public housing, back in the late 1970s and 1980s, the average was about 16,000 homes per year. We need much, much more than that.
Thanks for this, Steve. It's awfully refreshing to read something positive--and true--rather than endless carping about the dreadfulness of everything. And for all those unable to identify a ray of hope, listen: the perfect is the enemy of the good. It is not possible to solve all the problems everywhere all at once for everybody and fixating on that is paralytic. One starts by starting and hopes the unintended consequences are positive more often than not.
Is it too bold of me to assume that you might not be a renter in a decrepit basement?
But if it takes (probably much) more than a decade, and is this incremental - I really don't see how this would save a generation in a truly dire situation, right now. If this scenario plays out, a large part (and in many cases, a crucial part) of their adult life will have passed, with only marginal improvements on the horizon.
I really, truly, wanted this to cheer me up! Gawd damn it, not even the hopeful view is even that hope-filled.
Literally. Even if millennials (most of whom don't reasonably have a decade to wait to start families if they want them) were willing to deal with having young children in sub-standard conditions in an expectation things will get better, there's no reason anyone would have enough trust to take that leap. It took a real crisis, rather than 'just' a long decline in prospects, for the problem to be taken even remotely seriously by politicians. There's still little evidence governments will prioritize housing affordability if it means stepping on the toes of older Canadians in ways that go beyond the inconvenience of changing neighbourhoods and upzoning (which often even improves the value of existing SFH). What happens if there's not a win-win situation with the capacity (or money) to build housing and the population growth needed to give an aging population what they believe they were promised? No one's going to risk having a kid in their childhood bedroom with odds like that!
Not only will a large part of their adult life have passed; but a large part of their home equity building years will have paid their equity to rent. We have to build smaller starter units that are affordable, and efficiently and aesthetically designed, so that equity can be accumulated. That gives the future option to use equity to move up to bigger units, in lower interest rate cycles, as the family and its finances grow. Choices are inflations enemy.
If you are lucky enough to inherit, and can afford the tax hit, great. But who wants to wait to inherit? That is an artificial cycle interfering with the child bearing years.
We don't all need to live in big cities anymore. Canada is huge. It has lots of crown land. What is wrong with starting new towns from scratch, or growing our smaller ones, if they are affordable Volkswagens? We don't need Lamborghinis. That would take pressure off cities wouldn't it? The history of Israeli kibbutzim has some tips - good and bad.
I'm not even sure that we need to mention small towns, we need very desirable places to live anywhere other than southwestern BC, southern Ontario, Calgary, or Halifax.
People really like living in those cities, sometimes for obvious reasons, and we can't force people not to move there. I think it's a mix of liberalizing growth in those cities (as Steve outlined) and incentivizing jobs and culture in other areas - whether through government investment, lower land taxes, etc.
I get exactly what you are saying Jasper; but I hope you are not implying that small towns are not in the very desirable category. The small town where I live - area is a better term - is so desirable that we have growth issues that are changing the area's character.
Of course I agree that we can't force any law abiding person to move anywhere and can only incentivize them; but do we want to polarize cities and small towns from each other and internally by personal wealth? It can't possibly be a good thing if only people with means flock to cities and live well there, while job seekers flock there out of necessity to survive but possibly not thrive. Ditto for the homeless. Ditto for the addicts.
You said a word that needs to be said...."CROWN LAND" We have thousands and thousands of acres of crown land all across Canada. Why do we not start new towns from scratch? Why are we restricted from building needed housing on crown land? Why can't the people utilize Crown Land??
Crown land close to existing larger population centres is often set aside as parks or nature preserves, and those should stay that way. If government releases crown land for housing it will prefer to do so near existing infrastructure: roads, sewers, water systems, schools, hospitals, ambulance and fire and police services, etc. for speed of development, cost efficiency and job availability.
If an existing small town has suitable releasable crown land adjacent to it then that is likely the more practical and logical option. Building new towns from scratch is risky because people may decide they don’t want to live there and then we have a white elephant. It is doable with precise planning. Some have already postulated that there aren’t enough construction workers to build the needed inventory of housing let alone the infrastructure needed for a new from scratch town. There are solutions to that. Let highschool students who are itching to go to work and make good construction money do so. They can always go back for higher education with mature entry after the building boom settles.They may even be better students then. Modularize the buildings for assembly line efficiency; but individualize the facades and the landscaping. A new from scratch town can be put on wells (individual or shared) and septic systems rather than piped water and sewers. We may regret that in the future or we may be pleasantly pleased by the bigger lot size required and its accompanying provision of natural surroundings that are an extension of the smaller homes we will build on those lots. The digital age gives us a lot of flexibility with respect to the employment issues. People buying into from scratch towns will have to be more self-reliant and patient until services catch up.
I’m just throwing out ideas and am willing to be torn apart for them. We need solutions.
To oversimplify, people move where the jobs are. That's why people are cramming into the GTA, Montreal, and Metro Vancouver. (And why so many people are moving to Edmonton and Calgary.) There's plenty of housing in Tumbler Ridge, because there's few jobs.
Thing is, what Montreal and Edmonton have, that Toronto and Vancouver do not, is an "elastic housing supply." When people move there and prices start to go up, other people build more housing, keeping prices stable. That doesn't happen in Toronto and Vancouver, because you have high demand colliding with a slow, discretionary, revenue-maximizing municipal approval process. That's Poilievre's diagnosis, and the events of the last four weeks show that Sean Fraser and the Liberals both accept the diagnosis and are acting on it. https://morehousing.ca/cmhc-wedge
I live 200 km northeast of Toronto. This area is fast growing and desireable; but it has always been boom and bust here.
What floored me on Sunday was the admission by a service technician who came all the way from Toronto that he had given up on Toronto and was thinking of moving his family back to China after ten years in Canada because he works all the time and fears he will never be able to buy. He is where the jobs are; but ....
Yeah, when housing is scarce and expensive, your real wages are lower. In other words, high housing costs are making us poorer. I'm somewhat surprised that he would rather move his family back to China than to move somewhere like Calgary or Edmonton.
I'm glad we're getting to Liberal/Conservative consensus on the need for more housing, and on municipal gatekeepers as a key bottleneck. I particularly like the National Housing Accord proposal: https://morehousing.ca/national-housing-accord
Thanks for the link Russil. I skimmed through quickly and will need more time to digest your article.
I’m originally from a communist country; so I was also surprised that he would consider China as his option. We talked at length. I suggested Calgary and Edmonton where I used to live. He has friends in Yellowknife, where I have a relative. The cold scared him off and he wouldn’t believe me that the damp Toronto cold is more unpleasant to me than a much lower temperature dry cold. It is important to mention that for every suggestion I made he asked: “Are there Chinese there?”
When my dad and I came to Canada we slept in one bed in a room with a fridge and a hotplate. Eventually my dad saved enough to buy a war time house mortgage free (No telephone, no TV, no car, laundry at the coin laundry, ironed my jeans by putting them under the mattress, grocery shopping with my little red wagon that I hoped my friends wouldn’t see me with.) That isn’t possible anymore. I am not sharing this to preach, rather to point out that we once built a mass of war time houses in quick and cheap time. They are recognizable in all cities and most towns I have been to by the roof having absolutely minimal overhang to save on material. They were and are solid. We can do that again with will.
"Why do we not start new towns from scratch?" Well, Jane, as the saying goes, it's complicated.
First you need to find the particular land; even if a particular government has land in the "right" place it is quite a chore to tell folks that it will be used for Newtown A, instead of whatever we had thought previously. You know, appeals, demonstrations, vested interests, etc. Then, you need to find the money. Oh, sure, governments can borrow - see the federal balance sheet, not to mention the provinces, to see how much borrowing capacity they have.
Then you need to get the planning process done. Did we say this was quick? Nope! The bureaucrats will claim to need to "refine" the vision; public hearings; appeals; written plans (that will be ignored); etc., etc. Then we need to get contractors in to dig and construct roads, sewers, electrical, phone lines, etc., etc. Then we need to get home builders in to build the houses, apartments, etc. Then, then, then, then ....
Oh, and yeah, we need to build schools, fire halls, get a new municipality up and running, etc., etc.
All of those things can be done. Certainly it takes time but that time can be much compressed with real political will. Oh, that last is the critical missing piece!
So ...... it is a good idea but I don't see Canada - and, in particular, the various levels of government in Canada - moving at all quickly; experience tells me that. So, another good idea that Canada simply allows to float by without grabbing it.
Call me cynical but when you do call me cynical please also call me a realist.
And most importantly, where will people work in these new towns?
Wouldn't building on Crown Land invoke indigenous consultation?
The Calgary letter, where Sean Fraser said that he would not approve Housing Accelerator funding if council rejected its own task force recommendations again, was particularly eye-opening. Followed by the letter to Halifax, saying that they needed to allow four storeys everywhere: in Vancouver, pro-housing people are watching with great interest.
I thought what you said on Twitter captured it perfectly: Fraser is using the Housing Accelerator carrot as a stick. The Liberals are stealing Poilievre's ideas and outbidding him. Poilievre is promising $100M in bonus funding to municipalities; Fraser has 40X as much in the Housing Accelerator Fund. Poilievre is promising to remove the GST on new rental housing that's below-market, requiring some kind of evaluation process to decide whether each project is sufficiently affordable; the Liberals have already removed it on all new rental housing.
The letter was a stunt. Zoning has never held up housing supply in Calgary. The bottleneck is labor. Despite record immigration levels based on an alleged point based system, Canada can't seem to let in enough construction workers.
Doesn't Calgary need to start allowing more infill housing? I thought that was one of the most important recommendations of the housing affordability task force. https://morehousing.ca/calgary-task-force
In Vancouver, there's a lot of construction workers who are replacing old single-detached houses with new single-detached houses. If they were allowed to build multifamily housing instead (like townhouses or small apartment buildings), that would help.
Calgary probably has enough already approved infill sites to accommodate 100k+ in fills. Ontario and BC problems don't always apply in other parts of the country. Calgary has a ring of underdeveloped land around dt, much of which was former industrial or already demolished detached housing. An artifact of a boom and bust economiy is that ambitious plans demolish old buildings for new projects that don't get built. Think of Calgary as Vancouver in the 80s before Yaletown or Coal Harbor started, but with much of the land already cleared and remediated. The Beltline, East Village, Chinatown, Eau Claire, Sunalta, Bankview, Lower Mount Royal and Mission have plenty of available sites. In addition, many inner ring suburbs already have approved area redevelopment plans allowing densification that passed in the 80s and 90s during the Klein and Duerr years. Add to that large infill projects in the University District, Westbrook, Currie and Quarry Park.
I typically agree with everything that Steve says on housing policy. It does seem like the people that matter are coming around to the fact that land and land-use are the primary drivers of the housing crisis. Thanks for providing a round-up of the most relevant progress municipally.
We are going to bulldoze so much heritage and farms for the sake of catching up on building homes. We need to build. Can't we manage the need to build? No, this is Canada, we cannot because of petty fights, the rush to please and the need to stay relevant. My country is an embarassment.
I'll admit I'm confused by this one.
The numbers are bad... housing completions are flat over multiple decades while we're bringing in more immigrants than ever to fill that limited space. Supposedly there is reason for optimism because the political rhetoric has shifted?
How does this affect the disconnect in the numbers? Homebuilding is at capacity, so will tinkering with zoning regulations will make any difference to our housing shortfall? I don't see how.
In Metro Vancouver, there's a couple big opportunities to make better use of our construction work force. One is that there's a lot of people replacing old single-detached houses with new single-detached houses; they could just as easily be building small apartment buildings instead.
A second is location: the shortage is worst in the city of Vancouver, reflected in prices and rents, because hyperlocal opposition means it's harder to get a 40-storey building approved in Vancouver than an 80-storey building in Burnaby. It's like pushing down on a balloon: scarcity in Vancouver drives up prices and rents in Burnaby and Surrey. https://morehousing.ca/location
I think some of the land-use changes are more than just tinkering.
I agree that the best time for land-use reform was 1970, but the next best time is now.
We're so fortunate to live in a country where (at least some of the time) opposing parties and jurisdictions challenge eachother rather than antagonize.
When Toronto taxes its empty space as "four units as-of-right" on any lot in the city, two birds will die with one decision...and not be a burden to the rest of Ontario.
Provincial governments can impose rent controls if they had the political will. Provincial governments could outlaw AirBnBs so that all this mostly unused real estate would be available in the market place. There are so many solutions but, of course, it would require political will and the real estate industry to stop their piracy. Many, many realtors enrich themselves at the expense of both sellers and buyers. It's unconscionable.
Nothing destroys a city more effective, besides aerial bombardment, than rent control. It subverts the free market and when you don't have a market where supply is incentivized to meet demand, it just makes things worse for everyone except long term incumbent renters.
As for Airbnb, don't short term residents have the same housing needs as long term residents? Why are visitors less important?
Visitors less important? Are you kidding? If we have a shortage of homes in this country (and I believe we do) why are we concerned about allowing AirBnBs? You and I both know it's a scam. These AirBnbs spend most of the year empty. How ridiculous when we need homes for our young people and newcomers. I want MORE people paying taxes, not less. But of course, you might also think taxes are unnecessary. If that's so, you need to move to Florida. In Canada, most of us consider paying taxes our duty and we expect programs and services in return. Heard of healthcare?
I've heard of Canadian health care. It's mediocre at best to be honest. Nothing to write home about.
As for AirBNBs, why is it that so many have an opinion on what a property owner can do with their own property. Now some folks don't even want to allow a stranger to use their home and private property how they see fit. I know property rights don't exist in Canada but that is just a bit too big brother.
We have a shortage of homes, only quantity of homes matching the population of people who want to live there will fix the problem. Rent controls, occupancy controls, etc. just make the problem worse, all to appease folks who have no clue how the economy works (and their bank accounts show it).
There's rent controls in Vancouver. I'm not aware that it has destroyed Vancouver. As for the free market, that's what has caused the housing problem and resulted in out-of-control real estate prices with no end in sight. The market? My ass. The price of homes in Canada are seriously inflated. It's ridiculous. My home has at least quadrupled in value since I purchased it in 1993. How ridiculous. I consider it immoral that young people and, really, anyone who wishes, cannot afford either rent or to purchase a home. Developers, realtors and all those involved are making money hand over fist. It's out of control, not to mention off-shore home purchases or hedge funds investing in real estate at extortionate rates. Get real! This could all be mitigated if provincial governments had the will.
Alberta has no rent control other than only allowing one increase a year. It is a way more functional real estate market than BC, and it is a market that accepts free market fundamentals. In Edmonton the average family can afford the average home. In Calgary most families can afford homes, even if not in a choice neighborhood.
The free market works fine if you actually allow builders to build and landlords to run their businesses. Perhaps Vancouver could learn that.
Btw, without housing for young families you literally destroy a city, slower than a bomb but no less effective.
Forgot to say, in Vancouver (and probably Toronto) offshore purchases or homes bought as investment properties by hedge funds, etc. are also a huge issue. Shouldn't be allowed when our entire country is short of housing. The "free market" isn't serving us well at all.
Only because zoning subverts the free market. Some places way more than others. Vancouver has famously strict (and classist) zoning regs, therefore only the well to do can afford to buy or build there.
Kind of my point. Developers have a lot of influence as does the real estate industry. City planners and the city councils are often bullied and there is a lot of interference regarding zoning. There's not enough political will. I am pleased to know the federal government is bypassing provincial governments who have shown absolutely no intention of making sure there is affordable housing. I like that the federal government is dealing directly with municipalities. I think this will make a difference. How much difference, I don't know.
I don't think rent controls destroyed Vancouver's real estate market. Predatory realtors and developers have. I also don't agree that families can afford housing in Edmonton or Calgary. Many cannot afford the prices. I agree that not having available housing for young families will destroy a city. Unfortunately that's what's happening all over Canada but mostly in the large cities. There's no need for these prices. They are artificial and being kept that way by the real estate industry. The "free market" isn't working.
I'm curious to know what, if anything, the touted National Housing Council has produced in the way of recommendations since it was created in 2019....
I find living in a small town desirable, but I'm pretty sure that statistically Canada is still urbanizing.
I think it's a good reminder for me to think about which group I'm talking about. Very online, highly educated people who talk a lot about the housing crisis tend to want to live in Toronto, Vancouver, and Calgary... and nowhere else (exaggerating obviously), but you're right that that doesn't apply to Canadians as a whole.
...Although it does generally apply to e.g. international students where a lot of population growth is focused.
Two additional things that I thought of after I hit the Post button: where will people work, which you have identified; and, what about transportation from Newtown A to older centers to allow people to got to jobs in that old center?
As one further item, it later, later occurred to me that, yes, there is a lot of Crown land but where is it largely? Why, often in very remote areas so it would be even more difficult to develop. Crown land in closer in areas, such as cities, etc. tends to have been acquired for a specific purpose, e.g. city transit barns, garbage dumps, etc., etc. Frequently cities acquire that land when it is relatively cheaper and before the need it but need it they will so that close in Crown land is not usually a realistic candidate for new housing.
The other (somewhat macabre) part of this is a very big generation of homeowners (Boomers) is aging and will begin leaving this mortal coil over the coming decade or so. The oldest Boomers will turn 80 in 2026, so the following 20 years will likely see a lot of homes become available on market, along with estates shifting to their largely millennial children who have been priced out of the housing market. That won't solve everyone's problem -- not every boomer had a home and not every one of them did well enough to pass on anything to their kids. But, at the market/society level, it should provide some relief in addition to these policy initiatives.
You can't be serious. Canada's reputation, when people actually think of Canada, is of a country that performs below expectations.
Canada definitely performs well below potential