Canada’s housing crisis is the result of a number of factors, including a lack of adequate supply, “financialization,” which treats housing as an investment opportunity and stagnant wages in the face of inflation and rising costs.

In recent years, the federal government has made housing a top priority. Canada needs more homes. The federal government should commit to making massive, long-term, sustainable investments.

Our Asks

• Develop a Canadian homebuilding strategy, utilizing domestic lumber and wood 
• Commit to making massive, long-term, sustainable investments beyond those laid out in the National Housing Strategy and subsequent programs.
• Commit to the renewal of non-profit, co-op, and social housing through long-term, stable funding for new construction and rehabilitation.
• Continue to identify surplus federal lands upon which to develop residential buildings, earmarking those projects for non-market residences developed by builders that specialize in non-market work.
• Pursue options to make provincial funding conditional on the development of comprehensive rental regulation, including rent control (limiting the amount by which the rent paid by tenants for rental accommodation can increase) and tenancy control (limiting the amount by which the landlord can increase the rent between tenancies).
• Support provincial and municipal governments in passing and enforcing strict regulations that limit STR use to principal residences only and prohibit the commercial operation of unregulated “ghost hotels.” This could include providing funding to provincial and municipal governments for enforcement measures, but it could also mean passing federal legislation and/or regulations that supports enforcement and reins in the activities of the STR platforms themselves.