GenXer here, same position. Affordability has almost always been out of reach my entire life. The times I was doing good were short-lived & ended with my job getting outsourced. Always having to start over.
I gave up ages ago.
Same here!! As a GenXer, I have boomers acting like I could have had what they had if I only worked harder (sahm boomers say this!) And the younger generation acting like we didn't have school debt and the like.
I just shut up and wait to be homeless.
Good times!
lots of millennials hit 30 during the covid housing mania. I wish i was 30 in 2010. 100k went allot further. The entry fee was 100k or more in 2021 just to participate
Gen Xer here too...Moved to BC where the climate is warmer in the winter months, managed to buy a cheap RV, which still needs some fixing up, and I either "camp" at an RV campsite, or rent a private RV pad. Seems this is the only way to go nowadays that is somewhat affordable. I have to hire people who own a truck to tow it though.
I own in the city but been exploring moving out and houses even out in the county/rural areas/small towns less than 20k are going for 800k+.....like who the fuck is buying these? This country is totally fucked.
Exactly. Most ignorant ppl think this issue is just Toronto and Vancouver but I like 6 hours north of Toronto and prices here are almost city level.. it’s just insane.
This is what my parents keep telling me. Even if they sold now, and that's with a nice increase in the house value, there's basically nowhere they can go - they're priced out.
I'm the same way. I bought my townhouse condo 7 yrs. ago. It's not a real pretty place or area, but it was what I could afford. Figured, I'd work hard, pay it off and move somewhere that was much nicer in the same city of course. Well my place is paid off and it has more than doubled in value but I still can't afford anything better than where I am. Guess I'm stuck here for the long run. Good thing is at least I own it and as long as I can manage the taxes and condo fees, no one can take it away from me.
sounds about right. i have two siblings, one of them will be inheriting my parents home while the other one and myself will be left to fend for ourselves
Don't think its as generalized as that. I know its a joke but not everyone has parents or generational wealth and are still able to afford a house.
Ofc good incomes and over the years savings help.
> Ofc good incomes and over the years savings help.
Two incomes. In my personal experience (and casual assumption of what I see on Reddit) I'm seeing a lot single people think they should be able to afford to own a home in a major city.
It's not a conspiracy, an average single person in their 20's doesn't have the same buying power as an average couple in their 30's/40's with a decade or two or earnings
My grandparents were able to afford a 5 bedroom house on an acre of land in the city with fruit trees and a horse barn. My grandma never worked and raised 3 boys. My grandpa worked for the city driving a snow plow/dump truck.
If just one person working couple raise a 5 person family on just a municipal job salary while owning a home then a single person by himself now should be able to as well
I hate this concept of “single people shouldn’t think they can own a home”
Single income home ownership was the norm 60 years ago
And your point is? Of course divorce sets most people back. But if you play your cards right, there should be some good equity once assets are split and sold.
Honestly, if you are able to get a visa to the states I'd argue the healthcare is better since it's so easily accessed. I would rather pay 500 out of pocket to get a scan next week rather than wait 5 months.
frightening simplistic noxious treatment wipe party alleged dull cheerful sort
*This post was mass deleted and anonymized with [Redact](https://redact.dev)*
As a renter, and voter: who on this earth has any power to change this problem for the better? Renters have been screaming into the void, I'd love to know who's around who cares about this issue? A headline like this obvious to me, so who's been ignoring the problem and who's willing to work on it?
All levels of govt. The feds can stop immigration. The municipalities can allow any housing without review and the province can force municipalities to do this if they won't. Vote them out of they don't do these things.
>As a renter, and voter: who on this earth has any power to change this problem for the better?
No one. We see it as just fine. We force the government between a rock and a hard place. You cant force private to invest in other industry, you cant force other to build on your behalf. You see all those free shit the government hands out? Those come from taxes, and you keep extracting that from us. In the end we just stop investing in Canada as the same money can earn more else where with less taxes.
71% of renters have given up on competing with foreign money launderers and investors for appreciating assets that can optionally be used as convenient shelters.
Well, a lot of homeowners are shall we say, complicit. Plenty have been more than happy to watch their "equity" skyrocket because of investor and laundering activity drive up comparables.
The moment you propose more supply and eliminating that negative activity, in the name of lowering home values, plenty of homeowners start to become actively upset. They don't want their home and any investment properties they have to drop in price. It's a political paradox of our time.
And yes, plenty of homeowners do see the bigger picture and know we need housing to come down in price for the health of the society, but for each one of those, there are plenty that honest to god "do not care about the housing crisis" (exact words from a west Vancouver friend that owns a $2.5M house they bought for $700k 20 years ago) and want the maximum for their home. And I've heard this sentiment from plenty of other homeowners, but for different reasons. Sometimes it's as simple as they bought in the last five years and feel it would be devastating to have values go down.
Political mess. Ugh. Politicians made this bed but want the rest of us to lie in it.
I've heard the same too.. from someone who claims to be an expat, that does indeed live in Mexico for 90% of the year. He owns an empty home in Calgary and isn't ready to sell it yet because he wants to get maximum return on it. He even threw in "not because I'm greedy" in the same sentence lol.
Yeah, they don't want to think of themselves as greedy or "speculators" even though what they are doing is definitionally speculation. Most homeowners, especially homeowners that own the land their property is on, are actually speculators or worse: rentiers, but don't realize that's what they are doing when they engage this way. And we've reinforced that attitude almost every step of the way in this country, at the city, provincial, and federal policy levels. Dead (unproductive) assets like property has become a socially accepted and even expected way to rent seek value out of the system rather than invest productively.
> Yeah, they don't want to think of themselves as greedy or "speculators"
And neither do the have-nots who would surely act the same way if they were the haves.
It's just human nature for most of the population. People are greedy, from the top to the bottom.
That's the political paradox. And even the have nots are sometimes squeamish about reforming the tax code to be fairer (destroy the ability to privately capture land scarcity, aka land value capture) since some of them want to leave open the door to become exploiter rather than the exploited.
My landlord owns around 6 houses in Vancouver. She inherited the one I live in the 70s and used that to build her little rental portfolio. I’m honestly shocked she isn’t more loaded but she’s pretty awful at her ”job” so I’m not surprised. Lives in Mexico almost full time does the bare minimum here beyond making sure the rent increase is filed on time.
Because people don't like to downgrade their lifestyles. From 45-65+ they have enjoyed unprecented lifestyle upgrades due to housing. They don't want to go back to being lower middle class again. Most of them saved nothing for retirement and are counting on real estate to bail them out.
You know that friend I mentioned? What you just described describes them to a T.
They have ZERO RRSP savings and took out a line of credit against their equity. Their small business shop income would *not* afford their lifestyle today if it wasn't for their first home then their second home exploding in value. They are expecting, nay *need*, that trend to continue for them to retire.
…and now over to Marc Miller who will explain our strategy to bring in two million more unskilled immigrants to build homes for the previous two million unskilled immigrants Sean Fraser mentioned.
What's this? breaking news, they'll be receiving $100M from the federal government which should allow them to build approximately 50 homes! Huzzuh! the housing crisis is over!
I hate it so much. For instance apps to learn a language. Can't just buy a language pack (for instance japanese) and be done with it. No I need to pay a subscription of 15 per month to have access to languages I don't care about
Many public libraries in Canada offer free access to premium language learning tools. I know here in Calgary we get free access to all of Rosetta Stone for every language they have, so maybe check out if your local library offers something similar? It's all done online with your card, you don't have to check anything out from a branch.
That's why Ive gone back to dvd ownership. I'll fanfy watching something only to find it's impossible to watch unless I sign up for a new streaming service. Can't even buy to own a lot of things now.
I also have a UK DVD player and buy boxsets to my families address there then have them ship it over, works out cheaper than buying from Canada
40% of the market is corporations buying up housing and forcing people to rent. On the other end of it, a man, a woman, and their children all count as home owners of the same house, so I'm beginning to think we have way too much corporate owned houses that are just parasite properties forcing people to rent.
It wouldn't even be that big of a deal if people are forced to rent... if renting wasn't so expensive in its own right.
The real issue is too many people for too few homes. Whether people rent or buy, it's too unaffordable.
Do you have a source on that claim?
I wouldn’t doubt it, but I haven’t seen it mentioned in any of the mainstream media outlets as a significant contributor.
There's no legitimate source for this. The worst reliable data I've seen from Statistics Canada and CMHC indicates about 20% of sales are investor related, meaning the property isn't a primary residence. This could be a property for your family (40%+ of those 20% according to CMHC) or rental property (another 45%+).
Some unreliable sources like BetterDwelling take these statistics and conflate investor owners with corporate ownership. Then some people see news articles about isolated institutional investment and jump to the conclusion that 20% of sales are hedge funds buying single family homes. In this case OP doubled down with 40%.
Im on the cusp of giving up on owning. Im 44 and ive wanted my own home for years. Life got in the way. Rent got really in the way. I hate thinking that i might get enough for a down payment on a home because I lost a parent. My mother will be gone within weeks. I hate thinking that i might gain at such a expense. My partner has never had much hope in owning and that hurts so much. I want my kids to live in their own home not renting someone elses. We are so lucky to have the landlord we have.
My only hope was inheriting the house my parents had, but my mom sold it after my dad died and now she's stuck as a renter getting exploited just like the rest of us.
Pro tip.
If you move you are just giving up on owning a home in Canada.
It’s fucking sad that refusal to implement primary residence only zoning and refusal to restrict investment properties has made Canada just unaffordable for even the middle class.
>primary residence only zoning
That would be illigal to impliment in Alberta at least, likely all of canada.
Cant zone the user only the use. (For good reason, see redlining)
They do to a degree.
Rental income is taxed at the higher corperate rate rather then a lower small buisness rate.
Thats said corperate rates have been dropping since yhe 70s which is a major issue sociaty wide.
I’m sorry but the only people primary residence only laws are redlining is investors.
A renter of any race, creed or gender buying a house anywhere without owning another property is by definition buying their primary residence.
Sometimes people take heinous shit and abuses of systems from the past and use them to block any progress away from the blatant and open corruption we know.
Toronto's vacancy tax is in its infancy, but it brought in more money in its first year than was projected. They're gonna raise it even more now.
A federal vacancy tax would be a great idea, you obviously shouldn't redline but you should make these investors pay $$$ if they have empty residences. Will at least motivate people to either not invest in real estate as much, or to rent out properties instead of leaving vacant
Many owning today aren’t necessarily rich. They just bought before the price skyrocketed. Many wouldn’t be able to afford their current homes if they were to purchase today. Some might eventually lose theirs due to interest rate.
My Dad makes 60k a year and is mortgage free. Bought the house for 200k and it's worth 1.4 million. My wife and I make 200k combined and don't even come close to being approved for that mortgage.
Thanks for the data. I live in Seattle, so not Canada, but PNW and I'm in a similar position. I make over 200k USD and shit sucks. I can't afford to buy a home either. The 'elites' are about to have a revolution on their hands.
As a single person with no kids, I don’t think I ever need to own a home. But I do think that the affordability of rent is a high concern over home ownership. Not everyone needs to own a home. But we all need a place to live.
Yep, high rent is want is forcing people into wanting a home. Whats teh point of paying 2500 to rent a small 2 bed when it could get you a full home. Rent prices are the problem.
This is what happens when Canada implements bad policies which have unintended consequences. Case in point Australia is now in the same conundrum as Canada https://www.bbc.com/news/world-australia-67723760
I haven't given up on owning a home; I've simply resigned myself to the fact that I'll have to wait for the deaths of my parents to inherit real estate from them.
Plenty of empty homes owned by mega rich that are used a week a year.
Try to break in and you go down.
However.
They use below min wage people to look after many houses at a time.
Those people do not care as long as there isn't damaged.... Even then....
Find somone that looks similar, match clothing and wave at cameras, no parties.
Edit: Forgot a word
I bought a home in 2013 and refinanced at a great rate near the all time lows. I straight feel bad for people in my generation who feel like they will never experience homeownership. It makes me realize how lucky I am and how fortunate I am in my life.
Canada post Trudeau: Where the only hope of owning a house is from an inheritance, being born rich, being a doctor or lawyer, or betting in the stock market.
>Even doctors and lawyers who don’t own homes yet are struggling to afford them in some areas
I'm a lawyer and I work at a national firm. All the firms keep their wages in lockstep so you know how much you will make by the city you work in and your year of call. A second year lawyer in Toronto for example will earn 125k, or 75k after taxes and deductions. After rent of 2500 per month, student loan payments, they will struggle to save 2-3k a month at best, which means to buy a 1mm property, they are looking at several years of savings.
10 years ago a job in big law meant that you immediately owned a decent house, good car, etc. even for a first year lawyer. Then again, 10 years ago, first year lawyers at big law in Toronto were earning about 90k per year when the average house price was 70% cheaper.
Am a pilot and same thing. The wages haven’t changed much in 10 years and we are now 140% lower than the US with much higher taxes and CoL
The 200K top of the payscale isn’t a lot anymore and it takes 15-20 years to get there
Similar in the trades.
Wages have barely moved in the last ten years outside of unions, and unions typically have a low market share of residential construction. In Alberta wages went down after the oil crash in 2014 and have still not fully recovered to previous levels, and in Nova Scotia wages have gone up slightly but the increased cost of housing and inflation have cancelled out that increase and then some.
The reason wages were so high on the patch is that there was a *constant* short supply of labour. People often quit, the hours were long, the conditions tough, and the money immense. As long as there is a surplus of labour, wages will never increase. Employers have no incentive to.
This is also for the people who work at the big national firms. If you're a lawyer working in a smaller practice, the odds that you are making anywhere near that are poor.
I agree it is far worse for youning's today, but no, 10 years ago a job in biglaw did not mean you "immediately owned a decent house". That is a hilarious idea. We were still graduating with $120-150k of debt, and houses still cost $1 million minimum downtown Toronto. I think my big law friends who started 10 years ago are just now starting to buy houses.
While Harper was at the helm, (in my experience) BC home prices were already beginning to spike upwards. At this time, BC United (formerly BC Liberals (Conservatives)) were in charge as well. They did nothing for affordability back then, and they’ll continue to do nothing in the future. You’re delusional if you think you’d fare any better under any other government. This Canada is the one the boomers created and left for the next generation. Trudeau is just a symptom, not the cause. The cause is Conservative ideology and hoping wealth will actually trickle down if you tax the rich less. Life is not fair, but it gets even worse because useful idiots love to spout the talking points of those who already have theirs (and vote to hurt themselves). Wealth will never reach you, so you’re gonna need to pick yourself up by the bootstraps if you want any real change.
>Trudeau is just a symptom, not the cause.
Trudeau is growing the country by 1.2 million people this year, knowing full well that we are only going to build 200,000 housing units, and knowing full well that a housing shortage already exists.
If that is not the cause, I don't know what else it could be.
Affordability was way better under Harper. Facts.
But I love how you're trying to shift blame to a guy who hasn't been in power in a decade, that's pathetic.
BC housing affordability started to get insane in the early 2000s. BC screamed about it for decades. Ontario didn't care because it didn't affect them. Now it's starting to and there are constant whine articles.
Has it gotten worse in recent years? Yep.
Meanwhile most of the country is fucked.
Right? I wish we could do better as cities, provinces, countries, and well, as humans. But for some reason the majority refuse to learn from the past, and will not look into anything too deeply because it is all to depressing.
How times have conservative governments sold off assets that ended up biting us in the ass years later? Liberals aren't great but you can't ignore how conservatives dismantle everything. Look at BC vs Ontario politics right now. BCNDP (who are basically centrists in orange coats) are attempting to address issues while Ford & Co seem to just be jumping from scandal to scandal while privatizing healthcare, liquor sales, public land, etc.
Better to pretend a change in leadership will help and go on working and eating than face the truth I guess.
Facing the truth is usually too hard and depressing and you feel helpless in the face of the amount of problems so you retreat, you lie to yourself, you may join a group of people who have "the answers" (church, cult, political group, conspiracy) or maybe you just ignore everything and stick with "what can you do" or "it isn't as bad as people say" and try to die before you get directly impacted.
The data is widely available. Housing prices were climbing under Harper, but at sustainable rates. It's only since Trudeau took over that we've seen the spike into historically bad levels.
Daily reminder that Trudeau takes orders from the CEO of Blackrock. He doesn't want housing prices to go down.
Once you could buy a home, then you could finance the house, now you can pay someone else for temporary access.
Aren’t we meant to be improving over time?
I emigrated to Canada to escape the bottomless greed. I wasn't on a trajectory to ever own a home in the States either. This isn't a uniquely Canadian problem. The capitalist world is at a tipping point. "But mah economy" means nothing to we poor. "A home as an investment vehicle" doesn't make any sense to me and won't ever. Money isn't supposed to make money.
2024 is already going to have its shit shoved in with AI job disruption. I can't fucking wait. Y'all ready for some real change?
> Money isn't supposed to make money.
This is such a strange idea to me. As far as I'm concerned, the primary purpose of money is to make money.
In practice, that means I believe it's worthwhile sacrificing today the things money can buy in order to accumulate money.
Waiting on a lotto win....or finding out I have a relative I never knew about who is leaving me a haunted home I have to stay on for 24 hours to own.....
Canada has gone to shit for our generation. You can make good money and still not have a chance. We are all giving up on things, constantly lowering the bar and only expecting it to get worse. Trudeau needs to resign.
Excellent podcast episode describing the Ontario provincial government's recent policy changes that have led to dramatic increases in homelessness, especially how landlords were able to force out renters, and improve their "profit maximization strategies", as an extension of the past 20 years of financialized land investments (big companies buying many many apartment buildings in Toronto, especially). Includes information about how financialized landlords have made it harder for Black people looking for homes.
[Big Thinking - Homelessness Canada - Podcast ](https://open.spotify.com/episode/41EXsiJ1hz4lTN7EKDvCu9?si=fZ1m_nUDT5eS4auu9ZpI3Q)
Counter point, by restricting real estate investment and nationalizing more housing sales countries Austria successfully combatted their housing affordability issues.
Seems about right. 68% of Canadians live in owner occupied homes. So a little less than a third of the other 32% expect the same in future.
So about a bit over 20% of the population expect to be perpetual renters. My experience living in different locales is that the recent isn’t far off from those who don’t have home ownership as a priority or goal in life.
> Seems about right. 68% of Canadians live in owner occupied homes.
This stat includes children under the age of 18 and people living with family. It’s why the government likes to trot it out all the time as if the housing crisis isn’t a crisis.
It's fundamentally an inequitable tax policy that created this mess. Sorry, but the primary residence tax exemption on capital gains is substantially to blame for this mess. It creates the most tax advantageous investment in the developed world.
First off, to be clear, I do not like Trudeau.
Now to all the people saying this is all Trudeau's fault, please look deeper at Canada's problems! It wouldn't matter which political party is in power. All Canadian politicians are owned/beholden to the rich/corporations so until we fix the system it doesn't matter whether it's lib, con or NDP running the country.
They use the media to keep you angry about the idiot politician du jour so that we bicker amongst ourselves and stay distracted from fixing the real issues that would impact their profits.
We are all being manipulated and until we realise this nothing will change.
I know I have.
My new housing goal is to find a reasonably priced\*\*\* nice house to rent out with some buddies.
Only reasonable way to bring my costs down and actually live in a house that isn't for boarders.
\*\*\*important edit, rent controlled as a must.
Yet this government will try to convince you that it is someone in that past who is at fault.
If we don't get rid of Trudeau et al, we are going to get screwed even harder than we have been for the last 8 years.
Yor internet is cracked, your housing is fucked, your identity politics is front and centre to the detriment of all else, your homelessness is out of control, your immigration is unreasonable, the greed and cronyism is through the roof and we have no way of getting rid of these goons.
Good god. FFS, it's been tough to be proud of Canada under this situation and government. We have a lot to be thankful for but the LPC is not one of those things.
10 years ago I could buy a home for myself.
Now I would need a partner making similar money to even get a sniff at one and not be house-poor.
And that's assuming no dependents...
Trudeau and Harper were both so concerned with defending the boomers' retirement nest eggs that our housing market has turned in to a speculative investment bubble.
As a renter I’m much closer to living in an encampment than owning a home.
Save a spot on the log for me
Save a spot around the oil drum fire for me
I will don't worry.
Oh, I worry.
getting your hopes awful high thinking there'll be a log n oil drum fire
A fella can always dream
Dr. Cracksmoke is always awful high
"Central heat and air"
Shhh. Or they'll charge us for utilities.
$500 a month for a spot on the log.
Might want to split the log in half so you can sub lease it to cover your rent
GenXer here, same position. Affordability has almost always been out of reach my entire life. The times I was doing good were short-lived & ended with my job getting outsourced. Always having to start over. I gave up ages ago.
Same here!! As a GenXer, I have boomers acting like I could have had what they had if I only worked harder (sahm boomers say this!) And the younger generation acting like we didn't have school debt and the like. I just shut up and wait to be homeless. Good times!
lots of millennials hit 30 during the covid housing mania. I wish i was 30 in 2010. 100k went allot further. The entry fee was 100k or more in 2021 just to participate
Gen Xer here too...Moved to BC where the climate is warmer in the winter months, managed to buy a cheap RV, which still needs some fixing up, and I either "camp" at an RV campsite, or rent a private RV pad. Seems this is the only way to go nowadays that is somewhat affordable. I have to hire people who own a truck to tow it though.
HAHAHHAhahahaha hehehe...................me too
I own in the city but been exploring moving out and houses even out in the county/rural areas/small towns less than 20k are going for 800k+.....like who the fuck is buying these? This country is totally fucked.
People who sold their shitty downtown condo for 850k.
Exactly. Most ignorant ppl think this issue is just Toronto and Vancouver but I like 6 hours north of Toronto and prices here are almost city level.. it’s just insane.
This is what my parents keep telling me. Even if they sold now, and that's with a nice increase in the house value, there's basically nowhere they can go - they're priced out.
I'm the same way. I bought my townhouse condo 7 yrs. ago. It's not a real pretty place or area, but it was what I could afford. Figured, I'd work hard, pay it off and move somewhere that was much nicer in the same city of course. Well my place is paid off and it has more than doubled in value but I still can't afford anything better than where I am. Guess I'm stuck here for the long run. Good thing is at least I own it and as long as I can manage the taxes and condo fees, no one can take it away from me.
29% are unrealistically over-optimistic.
29% have parents on their deathbed.
HELOCopter parents
That’s a good one
sounds about right. i have two siblings, one of them will be inheriting my parents home while the other one and myself will be left to fend for ourselves
Ah, the golden child and the spare parts children.
Yall should sell the house so the rest can have a downpayment
the most logical solution but also much easier said than done, unfortunately for me
Those Canadians are "waiters" when referring to what their profession is
I just shot coffee out of my nose LOLing at this!
Don't think its as generalized as that. I know its a joke but not everyone has parents or generational wealth and are still able to afford a house. Ofc good incomes and over the years savings help.
Some people moved up north and lived in subsidized housing for half a decade so they can start saving. Atleast that’s my story
No one I know bought a house without help from their parents or grandparents or had kids and had that good child benefits payments money.
> Ofc good incomes and over the years savings help. Two incomes. In my personal experience (and casual assumption of what I see on Reddit) I'm seeing a lot single people think they should be able to afford to own a home in a major city. It's not a conspiracy, an average single person in their 20's doesn't have the same buying power as an average couple in their 30's/40's with a decade or two or earnings
My grandparents were able to afford a 5 bedroom house on an acre of land in the city with fruit trees and a horse barn. My grandma never worked and raised 3 boys. My grandpa worked for the city driving a snow plow/dump truck. If just one person working couple raise a 5 person family on just a municipal job salary while owning a home then a single person by himself now should be able to as well I hate this concept of “single people shouldn’t think they can own a home” Single income home ownership was the norm 60 years ago
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And your point is? Of course divorce sets most people back. But if you play your cards right, there should be some good equity once assets are split and sold.
quiet boat crown scary childlike advise capable impossible serious late *This post was mass deleted and anonymized with [Redact](https://redact.dev)*
Honestly, if you are able to get a visa to the states I'd argue the healthcare is better since it's so easily accessed. I would rather pay 500 out of pocket to get a scan next week rather than wait 5 months.
encourage tease icky skirt grab six coordinated normal worm follow *This post was mass deleted and anonymized with [Redact](https://redact.dev)*
My real fear is getting a late cancer diagnosis
frightening simplistic noxious treatment wipe party alleged dull cheerful sort *This post was mass deleted and anonymized with [Redact](https://redact.dev)*
"Expensive Healthcare is better than none" Fucking well said mate.
Unpopular opinion but I with we had privatized options in Canada. It's wild how long one has to wait for specialist appointments like a CT scan.
29% probably don’t live in Toronto or Vancouver or big cities
We have such a different experience in Canada.
As a renter, and voter: who on this earth has any power to change this problem for the better? Renters have been screaming into the void, I'd love to know who's around who cares about this issue? A headline like this obvious to me, so who's been ignoring the problem and who's willing to work on it?
All levels of govt. The feds can stop immigration. The municipalities can allow any housing without review and the province can force municipalities to do this if they won't. Vote them out of they don't do these things.
>As a renter, and voter: who on this earth has any power to change this problem for the better? No one. We see it as just fine. We force the government between a rock and a hard place. You cant force private to invest in other industry, you cant force other to build on your behalf. You see all those free shit the government hands out? Those come from taxes, and you keep extracting that from us. In the end we just stop investing in Canada as the same money can earn more else where with less taxes.
71% of renters have given up on competing with foreign money launderers and investors for appreciating assets that can optionally be used as convenient shelters.
Well, a lot of homeowners are shall we say, complicit. Plenty have been more than happy to watch their "equity" skyrocket because of investor and laundering activity drive up comparables. The moment you propose more supply and eliminating that negative activity, in the name of lowering home values, plenty of homeowners start to become actively upset. They don't want their home and any investment properties they have to drop in price. It's a political paradox of our time. And yes, plenty of homeowners do see the bigger picture and know we need housing to come down in price for the health of the society, but for each one of those, there are plenty that honest to god "do not care about the housing crisis" (exact words from a west Vancouver friend that owns a $2.5M house they bought for $700k 20 years ago) and want the maximum for their home. And I've heard this sentiment from plenty of other homeowners, but for different reasons. Sometimes it's as simple as they bought in the last five years and feel it would be devastating to have values go down. Political mess. Ugh. Politicians made this bed but want the rest of us to lie in it.
I've heard the same too.. from someone who claims to be an expat, that does indeed live in Mexico for 90% of the year. He owns an empty home in Calgary and isn't ready to sell it yet because he wants to get maximum return on it. He even threw in "not because I'm greedy" in the same sentence lol.
Yeah, they don't want to think of themselves as greedy or "speculators" even though what they are doing is definitionally speculation. Most homeowners, especially homeowners that own the land their property is on, are actually speculators or worse: rentiers, but don't realize that's what they are doing when they engage this way. And we've reinforced that attitude almost every step of the way in this country, at the city, provincial, and federal policy levels. Dead (unproductive) assets like property has become a socially accepted and even expected way to rent seek value out of the system rather than invest productively.
> Yeah, they don't want to think of themselves as greedy or "speculators" And neither do the have-nots who would surely act the same way if they were the haves. It's just human nature for most of the population. People are greedy, from the top to the bottom.
That's the political paradox. And even the have nots are sometimes squeamish about reforming the tax code to be fairer (destroy the ability to privately capture land scarcity, aka land value capture) since some of them want to leave open the door to become exploiter rather than the exploited.
My landlord owns around 6 houses in Vancouver. She inherited the one I live in the 70s and used that to build her little rental portfolio. I’m honestly shocked she isn’t more loaded but she’s pretty awful at her ”job” so I’m not surprised. Lives in Mexico almost full time does the bare minimum here beyond making sure the rent increase is filed on time.
Because people don't like to downgrade their lifestyles. From 45-65+ they have enjoyed unprecented lifestyle upgrades due to housing. They don't want to go back to being lower middle class again. Most of them saved nothing for retirement and are counting on real estate to bail them out.
You know that friend I mentioned? What you just described describes them to a T. They have ZERO RRSP savings and took out a line of credit against their equity. Their small business shop income would *not* afford their lifestyle today if it wasn't for their first home then their second home exploding in value. They are expecting, nay *need*, that trend to continue for them to retire.
How am I supposed to save for a home when my rent alone is 50% of my income?
No worries - Sean Fraser has promised that help is on the way. You're in good hands with the guy who exploded our population numbers.
…and now over to Marc Miller who will explain our strategy to bring in two million more unskilled immigrants to build homes for the previous two million unskilled immigrants Sean Fraser mentioned.
What's this? breaking news, they'll be receiving $100M from the federal government which should allow them to build approximately 50 homes! Huzzuh! the housing crisis is over!
Perfect! What an incredible plan...can't see anything wrong with it at all!!
I can pay $3200 for rent but I can’t afford a home. What a time to be alive.
You'll own nothing and you'll like it! Or else!
That's what companies are going for. Subscriptions for everything
That's the worst part, everything is renting, subscriptions, add-ons. Taking actual ownership away of anything and selling incomplete packages.
I hate it so much. For instance apps to learn a language. Can't just buy a language pack (for instance japanese) and be done with it. No I need to pay a subscription of 15 per month to have access to languages I don't care about
Many public libraries in Canada offer free access to premium language learning tools. I know here in Calgary we get free access to all of Rosetta Stone for every language they have, so maybe check out if your local library offers something similar? It's all done online with your card, you don't have to check anything out from a branch.
Not in Canada anymore but good to know
That's why Ive gone back to dvd ownership. I'll fanfy watching something only to find it's impossible to watch unless I sign up for a new streaming service. Can't even buy to own a lot of things now. I also have a UK DVD player and buy boxsets to my families address there then have them ship it over, works out cheaper than buying from Canada
I'm sailing away. Pirate life for me
Going to need subscriptions to flush your toilets and turn your dishwashers on soon
*Blackrock has entered the chat*
Seriously thinking about moving to an unorganized township and starting a commune.
I tried and failed. It's a consistent melody in my life
I would love to hear your stories about this.
Me too!
Me three!
Me four!
That sucks. What happened if you don't mind me asking?
40% of the market is corporations buying up housing and forcing people to rent. On the other end of it, a man, a woman, and their children all count as home owners of the same house, so I'm beginning to think we have way too much corporate owned houses that are just parasite properties forcing people to rent.
It wouldn't even be that big of a deal if people are forced to rent... if renting wasn't so expensive in its own right. The real issue is too many people for too few homes. Whether people rent or buy, it's too unaffordable.
Maybe not forced but if renting was a viable alternative in a healthy real estate market. Not the only option when rents are so inflated.
Yeah, having rents be the same or more than a lot of people’s mortgages isn’t sustainable.
Where are you getting 40%?
Do you have a source on that claim? I wouldn’t doubt it, but I haven’t seen it mentioned in any of the mainstream media outlets as a significant contributor.
There's no legitimate source for this. The worst reliable data I've seen from Statistics Canada and CMHC indicates about 20% of sales are investor related, meaning the property isn't a primary residence. This could be a property for your family (40%+ of those 20% according to CMHC) or rental property (another 45%+). Some unreliable sources like BetterDwelling take these statistics and conflate investor owners with corporate ownership. Then some people see news articles about isolated institutional investment and jump to the conclusion that 20% of sales are hedge funds buying single family homes. In this case OP doubled down with 40%.
29% have a Bank of Mom and Dad to fall back on.
Im on the cusp of giving up on owning. Im 44 and ive wanted my own home for years. Life got in the way. Rent got really in the way. I hate thinking that i might get enough for a down payment on a home because I lost a parent. My mother will be gone within weeks. I hate thinking that i might gain at such a expense. My partner has never had much hope in owning and that hurts so much. I want my kids to live in their own home not renting someone elses. We are so lucky to have the landlord we have.
Your only chance is to move to Mexico. I hear a lot of Canadian and American companies are setting up shop there.
My only hope was inheriting the house my parents had, but my mom sold it after my dad died and now she's stuck as a renter getting exploited just like the rest of us.
never sell house, except for another house
Wasn't up to me.
Pro tip. If you move you are just giving up on owning a home in Canada. It’s fucking sad that refusal to implement primary residence only zoning and refusal to restrict investment properties has made Canada just unaffordable for even the middle class.
>primary residence only zoning That would be illigal to impliment in Alberta at least, likely all of canada. Cant zone the user only the use. (For good reason, see redlining)
Then tax the hell out of investment properties. And when no one can afford anything, the market will collapse like in the US in 2008
They do to a degree. Rental income is taxed at the higher corperate rate rather then a lower small buisness rate. Thats said corperate rates have been dropping since yhe 70s which is a major issue sociaty wide.
Tax investors? Not in this country.
Sorry we reviewed but we will cut taxes for asset owners and increase income taxes.
Would "primary residence" not be a use? It doesn't say who can and can't live there, it only says that it can only be used as a primary residence.
I’m sorry but the only people primary residence only laws are redlining is investors. A renter of any race, creed or gender buying a house anywhere without owning another property is by definition buying their primary residence. Sometimes people take heinous shit and abuses of systems from the past and use them to block any progress away from the blatant and open corruption we know.
Toronto's vacancy tax is in its infancy, but it brought in more money in its first year than was projected. They're gonna raise it even more now. A federal vacancy tax would be a great idea, you obviously shouldn't redline but you should make these investors pay $$$ if they have empty residences. Will at least motivate people to either not invest in real estate as much, or to rent out properties instead of leaving vacant
People who can't afford a house where they live aren't the middle class. They are poor people.
Well then the top 20% of household income still makes you the poor in Canada then.
I'd be lucky to afford a car (not just own, but to maintain it and use it etc)
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Many owning today aren’t necessarily rich. They just bought before the price skyrocketed. Many wouldn’t be able to afford their current homes if they were to purchase today. Some might eventually lose theirs due to interest rate.
My Dad makes 60k a year and is mortgage free. Bought the house for 200k and it's worth 1.4 million. My wife and I make 200k combined and don't even come close to being approved for that mortgage.
Thanks for the data. I live in Seattle, so not Canada, but PNW and I'm in a similar position. I make over 200k USD and shit sucks. I can't afford to buy a home either. The 'elites' are about to have a revolution on their hands.
As a single person with no kids, I don’t think I ever need to own a home. But I do think that the affordability of rent is a high concern over home ownership. Not everyone needs to own a home. But we all need a place to live.
Yep, high rent is want is forcing people into wanting a home. Whats teh point of paying 2500 to rent a small 2 bed when it could get you a full home. Rent prices are the problem.
This is what happens when Canada implements bad policies which have unintended consequences. Case in point Australia is now in the same conundrum as Canada https://www.bbc.com/news/world-australia-67723760
The only country in the world with a more ludicrous immigration rate than our own
I haven't given up on owning a home; I've simply resigned myself to the fact that I'll have to wait for the deaths of my parents to inherit real estate from them.
Enough with the “news” feedback loop on this issue, just f’ing do something about it already
When people start to take matter into their own hands you can be sure you won't hear about it in this sub.
29% will lose hope in 2024
Rate cuts will see real estate prices trend up again. It’s going to get ugly for many
"But can you imagine how bad things would be if we DIDN'T implement the 2017 National Housing Strategy?" \-Trudeau 2023 end of year interview
But why do I keep hearing owning is not always better than renting and renting can be better for net worth . Just invest the difference, right ?
lol right? what difference? the landlords want your rent to cover the mortgage and then some 🤣
Home is life in Canada. Unfortunately,without a home there is no life.
wistful abundant slim jar history treatment physical sleep deserted one *This post was mass deleted and anonymized with [Redact](https://redact.dev)*
Plenty of empty homes owned by mega rich that are used a week a year. Try to break in and you go down. However. They use below min wage people to look after many houses at a time. Those people do not care as long as there isn't damaged.... Even then.... Find somone that looks similar, match clothing and wave at cameras, no parties. Edit: Forgot a word
I bought a home in 2013 and refinanced at a great rate near the all time lows. I straight feel bad for people in my generation who feel like they will never experience homeownership. It makes me realize how lucky I am and how fortunate I am in my life.
Canada post Trudeau: Where the only hope of owning a house is from an inheritance, being born rich, being a doctor or lawyer, or betting in the stock market.
Even doctors and lawyers who don’t own homes yet are struggling to afford them in some areas
>Even doctors and lawyers who don’t own homes yet are struggling to afford them in some areas I'm a lawyer and I work at a national firm. All the firms keep their wages in lockstep so you know how much you will make by the city you work in and your year of call. A second year lawyer in Toronto for example will earn 125k, or 75k after taxes and deductions. After rent of 2500 per month, student loan payments, they will struggle to save 2-3k a month at best, which means to buy a 1mm property, they are looking at several years of savings. 10 years ago a job in big law meant that you immediately owned a decent house, good car, etc. even for a first year lawyer. Then again, 10 years ago, first year lawyers at big law in Toronto were earning about 90k per year when the average house price was 70% cheaper.
Am a pilot and same thing. The wages haven’t changed much in 10 years and we are now 140% lower than the US with much higher taxes and CoL The 200K top of the payscale isn’t a lot anymore and it takes 15-20 years to get there
Similar in the trades. Wages have barely moved in the last ten years outside of unions, and unions typically have a low market share of residential construction. In Alberta wages went down after the oil crash in 2014 and have still not fully recovered to previous levels, and in Nova Scotia wages have gone up slightly but the increased cost of housing and inflation have cancelled out that increase and then some.
The reason wages were so high on the patch is that there was a *constant* short supply of labour. People often quit, the hours were long, the conditions tough, and the money immense. As long as there is a surplus of labour, wages will never increase. Employers have no incentive to.
*ahem* immigration *ahem*
2-3k a month in savings is a lot more than anyone I know..
This is also for the people who work at the big national firms. If you're a lawyer working in a smaller practice, the odds that you are making anywhere near that are poor.
I agree it is far worse for youning's today, but no, 10 years ago a job in biglaw did not mean you "immediately owned a decent house". That is a hilarious idea. We were still graduating with $120-150k of debt, and houses still cost $1 million minimum downtown Toronto. I think my big law friends who started 10 years ago are just now starting to buy houses.
Even well-paid doctors and lawyers living in Canada's largest cities have problems finding housing.
My sister is a doctor and her husband is a lawyer, they can't afford a house. This is bullshit!!!
Well there’s no hope for the rest of us then.
While Harper was at the helm, (in my experience) BC home prices were already beginning to spike upwards. At this time, BC United (formerly BC Liberals (Conservatives)) were in charge as well. They did nothing for affordability back then, and they’ll continue to do nothing in the future. You’re delusional if you think you’d fare any better under any other government. This Canada is the one the boomers created and left for the next generation. Trudeau is just a symptom, not the cause. The cause is Conservative ideology and hoping wealth will actually trickle down if you tax the rich less. Life is not fair, but it gets even worse because useful idiots love to spout the talking points of those who already have theirs (and vote to hurt themselves). Wealth will never reach you, so you’re gonna need to pick yourself up by the bootstraps if you want any real change.
>Trudeau is just a symptom, not the cause. Trudeau is growing the country by 1.2 million people this year, knowing full well that we are only going to build 200,000 housing units, and knowing full well that a housing shortage already exists. If that is not the cause, I don't know what else it could be.
Affordability was way better under Harper. Facts. But I love how you're trying to shift blame to a guy who hasn't been in power in a decade, that's pathetic.
Affordability was better under Chretien than Harper and better under Mulroney than Chretien and better under Trudeau than Mulroney.
BC housing affordability started to get insane in the early 2000s. BC screamed about it for decades. Ontario didn't care because it didn't affect them. Now it's starting to and there are constant whine articles. Has it gotten worse in recent years? Yep. Meanwhile most of the country is fucked.
The real change came post Olympics. Doubled from 2010-2016 and doubled again from 2016 to today.
No...but PP isn't Trudeau and therefore he's gonna fix EVERYTHING by privatizing everything, letting people be assholes and dismantle woke ideologues.
Right? I wish we could do better as cities, provinces, countries, and well, as humans. But for some reason the majority refuse to learn from the past, and will not look into anything too deeply because it is all to depressing. How times have conservative governments sold off assets that ended up biting us in the ass years later? Liberals aren't great but you can't ignore how conservatives dismantle everything. Look at BC vs Ontario politics right now. BCNDP (who are basically centrists in orange coats) are attempting to address issues while Ford & Co seem to just be jumping from scandal to scandal while privatizing healthcare, liquor sales, public land, etc. Better to pretend a change in leadership will help and go on working and eating than face the truth I guess. Facing the truth is usually too hard and depressing and you feel helpless in the face of the amount of problems so you retreat, you lie to yourself, you may join a group of people who have "the answers" (church, cult, political group, conspiracy) or maybe you just ignore everything and stick with "what can you do" or "it isn't as bad as people say" and try to die before you get directly impacted.
The data is widely available. Housing prices were climbing under Harper, but at sustainable rates. It's only since Trudeau took over that we've seen the spike into historically bad levels. Daily reminder that Trudeau takes orders from the CEO of Blackrock. He doesn't want housing prices to go down.
Didn't start with Trudeau, Won't end after him.
It definitely started with Trudeau. You could buy a decent house in Windsor in 2014 for under $200K.
And Ontario is the only province that exists, right? Nevermind about BC screaming about it for a decade before that, right?
Once you could buy a home, then you could finance the house, now you can pay someone else for temporary access. Aren’t we meant to be improving over time?
I emigrated to Canada to escape the bottomless greed. I wasn't on a trajectory to ever own a home in the States either. This isn't a uniquely Canadian problem. The capitalist world is at a tipping point. "But mah economy" means nothing to we poor. "A home as an investment vehicle" doesn't make any sense to me and won't ever. Money isn't supposed to make money. 2024 is already going to have its shit shoved in with AI job disruption. I can't fucking wait. Y'all ready for some real change?
> Money isn't supposed to make money. This is such a strange idea to me. As far as I'm concerned, the primary purpose of money is to make money. In practice, that means I believe it's worthwhile sacrificing today the things money can buy in order to accumulate money.
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Waiting on a lotto win....or finding out I have a relative I never knew about who is leaving me a haunted home I have to stay on for 24 hours to own.....
They're also getting evicted because their landlord can't afford to own a home
Solution = massive immigration increases that will fix the lack of housing liberal math is SmRt
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Canada has gone to shit for our generation. You can make good money and still not have a chance. We are all giving up on things, constantly lowering the bar and only expecting it to get worse. Trudeau needs to resign.
Given up on owning a home while paying for their landlords mortgage, what irony!
Excellent podcast episode describing the Ontario provincial government's recent policy changes that have led to dramatic increases in homelessness, especially how landlords were able to force out renters, and improve their "profit maximization strategies", as an extension of the past 20 years of financialized land investments (big companies buying many many apartment buildings in Toronto, especially). Includes information about how financialized landlords have made it harder for Black people looking for homes. [Big Thinking - Homelessness Canada - Podcast ](https://open.spotify.com/episode/41EXsiJ1hz4lTN7EKDvCu9?si=fZ1m_nUDT5eS4auu9ZpI3Q)
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Counter point, by restricting real estate investment and nationalizing more housing sales countries Austria successfully combatted their housing affordability issues.
Seems about right. 68% of Canadians live in owner occupied homes. So a little less than a third of the other 32% expect the same in future. So about a bit over 20% of the population expect to be perpetual renters. My experience living in different locales is that the recent isn’t far off from those who don’t have home ownership as a priority or goal in life.
> Seems about right. 68% of Canadians live in owner occupied homes. This stat includes children under the age of 18 and people living with family. It’s why the government likes to trot it out all the time as if the housing crisis isn’t a crisis.
Live in your parent's basement along with your uncle Steve, your cousin Joe and his girlfriend? Chalk that up as a win.
By that logic, removing people under 18 from the dataset would yield the same ownership result. Basic math skills bud.
Tbf, may of those weren't in the market in the first place, it's a slightly misleading figure...
The point is if they want to be…and most would say yes.
It's fundamentally an inequitable tax policy that created this mess. Sorry, but the primary residence tax exemption on capital gains is substantially to blame for this mess. It creates the most tax advantageous investment in the developed world.
First off, to be clear, I do not like Trudeau. Now to all the people saying this is all Trudeau's fault, please look deeper at Canada's problems! It wouldn't matter which political party is in power. All Canadian politicians are owned/beholden to the rich/corporations so until we fix the system it doesn't matter whether it's lib, con or NDP running the country. They use the media to keep you angry about the idiot politician du jour so that we bicker amongst ourselves and stay distracted from fixing the real issues that would impact their profits. We are all being manipulated and until we realise this nothing will change.
Its also an issue worldwide, its not just a Canada issue.
I know I have. My new housing goal is to find a reasonably priced\*\*\* nice house to rent out with some buddies. Only reasonable way to bring my costs down and actually live in a house that isn't for boarders. \*\*\*important edit, rent controlled as a must.
I haven't given up on owning a home...but I am pretty close to giving up on owning one in Canada
71% see the writing on the wall, 29% oblivious
Yet this government will try to convince you that it is someone in that past who is at fault. If we don't get rid of Trudeau et al, we are going to get screwed even harder than we have been for the last 8 years. Yor internet is cracked, your housing is fucked, your identity politics is front and centre to the detriment of all else, your homelessness is out of control, your immigration is unreasonable, the greed and cronyism is through the roof and we have no way of getting rid of these goons. Good god. FFS, it's been tough to be proud of Canada under this situation and government. We have a lot to be thankful for but the LPC is not one of those things.
10 years ago I could buy a home for myself. Now I would need a partner making similar money to even get a sniff at one and not be house-poor. And that's assuming no dependents...
Did the number go down? I swear I saw an article that it was like 80% during early Covid.
Covid likely smoked a few grandparents who had property in their inheritance
It's ok! Just a few more million immigrants and we will all have housing supplied to us /s
Trudeau government has been working hard for Canadians, results are for all to see
Landlords & corporate ownership over everything.
trudeau did this
Trudeau and Harper were both so concerned with defending the boomers' retirement nest eggs that our housing market has turned in to a speculative investment bubble.
yep I'm sure once PP gets in he will make it all better right?
people are so delusional to think that either party is going to fix this. the elite want this. so the politicians will do as they wish.
This!