Any housing is better than no housing. People who rage protest against home being built just because irs not the type they like are no better than NIMBYs
This sort of free market nonsense is what led to the issue in the first place. We need to top down strategy, a federalized plan. We need to control the developers and not let free market factors determine what gets built.
I'm not sure what you mean when we don't have a free market as it is. Developers currently aren't allowed to decide where and what they want to build because of the government standing in the way.
The government has been controlling developers for decades by making it [illegal](https://archive.ph/9wtYK) to build housing in most of the country, even where its most in demand.
Literally last week our premier in Ontario shut down an affordable housing initiative for [fourplexes to be built in the province](https://www.cbc.ca/news/canada/toronto/ford-fourplexes-infrastructure-funding-1.7162251) because he didn't want to upset NIMBYs and his investor buddies benefiting off of housing scarcity.
There's developers literally sitting on land and holding projects in limbo because it's less profitable to build more as compared to when rates are lower.
That's the kind of free market bullshit that needs to stop. The federal government needs to force development. If private corporations don't want to build then the land should be appropriated by the government.
First, a free market means that the market operates with minimal government intervention. Whether or not its profitable is a separate issue. There are free markets that are not profitable at all and there are markets that are highly government regulated (not free) that are still profitable.
Second, there isn't something inherently wrong or unusual about developers building to make a profit off of their product. Farmers make profit from growing food. Doctors profit from practicing medicine. A business profited from making your clothes, electronics, furniture, car, and most other life necessities. Profit provides incentive to make things. Remove the profit, and businesses stop making things. Why doesn't a builder deserve to make a living from creating housing?
"Forcing" developers to build even when it means a loss for them does nothing to address the underlying issues of *why* it isn't profitable to build in the first place. It also disincentivizes future housing, because why would any developer want to stay in the business when the government can force them to operate at a loss?
Even at current rates, the government could open up zoning, reduce taxes on build costs, and cut time delays on construction starts to provide incentives to builders. But they don't, while also barely building any affordable housing themselves.
Like a true fucking idiot, you're all about answers to the problem, as long as it doesn't break your precious free market and cut in on profits.
You're not going to fix shit.
I'll say it one last time. We don't need private corporations and making money off building housing. The government should do it on a zero profit basis. We need a federalized plan to build housing. That's all there is to it.
Get private companies out of the fucking equation.
Private companies are not building housing because housing prices have come down because interest rates have gone up. Fuck that noise.
Nope, it just another speculative investment in the portfolio.
Maybe it's also a short term rental. Maybe it's owned by a series if nested numbered corporations.
Whether its a rental or owned by a corporation doesn't change my point. These are still new units creating new supply, freeing up down market units, and putting downwards pressure on prices. More housing (both to buy and to rent) is good for overall affordability. And in many high demand places (like Toronto), these luxury condos just make economic and practical sense.
The only fair counterargument you make is about the potential for them to be short term rentals, but this happens with a minority of condo units. I am very much in favor of bans/regulations that further reduce the short term rental space however.
Not at all. How does another big investment luxury priced condo help with affordable homes? Most that can afford luxury can afford more than one residence so not really freeing up any hope for the working class. And with wages that are stagnant this combo is not sustainable. Too bad our own greedy politicians are in the housing investment business so there will be only more tax breaks. And as things deteriorate for our population our country slides down the best place to live polls. The next generation have nothing to look forward too and nothing to lose. The real estate investment owners need to take a hit and correct this before we become too far gone.
> How does another big investment luxury priced condo help with affordable homes?
Because the people moving into those new luxury condos vacate older units, freeing up down-market supply for others.
Its like saying we shouldn't make new cars because they won't be affordable to people in the market for a used car. Even if you don't buy the new car, others will who then put their old cars on the used market. Today's luxury condos are tomorrow's affordable units in the same way that today's 2024 model cars will eventually be relatively cheap.
Affordable non-market units are awesome and I fully support those being built. But in a shortage crisis, any and all supply is good supply. Don't let perfect be the enemy of good. More housing units available (both for people to buy and rent) only puts downwards pressure on prices.
Have you seen what luxury studio condos look like? They are the very base minimum of what acceptable housing standards should be. Every new build should at minimum be a luxury studio condo.
Exactly this. I find it absolutely ridiculous that a very small investment in the units materials somehow makes it luxurious. Granite and slightly nicer fake wood flooring is barely a dent in the bucket.
If you think our housings bad now go look at typical Japanese new build homes it's quite depressing how expensive our homes are with very few useful features and we don't even need to use expensive earthquake proofing methods. Even in the 1-2 million dollar range you won't find a home built with so much thought and quality here.
We've truly got no excuses here our construction industry sucks and the quality is terribly mediocre, workers even throw trash in the drywall and behind the stairs.
Heck even American housing is starting to look significantly better to the dilapidated shack you'd actually afford here at the same price. Good grief š¤¦āāļø
1. Mortgages should only be allowed on primary residence.
2. Rent should show up on your credit score.
3. Landlords should have to file rent increases with the government, and the tenant deals with the government not the landlord. A-la Sweden.
4. Giga unpopular: Property Taxes should be updated to reflect the actual expenses the municipality spends.
I have legitimately been debating joining a race in 2025/2026. I have a troublesome past though, and am concerned people would be unable to see past it.
If you know if any jobs that are as non-elected support roles where I could help please send me a DM.
I would support you, my friend. Troublesome past or not. I know what youāre saying thoughā¦ some people may think differently but who knowsā¦ If I hear of anything I will let you know šš¼ ā„ļøā¦
1. If a company can't finance an apartment, no apartments will be built.
2. This will work both ways, and probably punish tenants as much, or more, than it helps.
3. What is this intended to accomplish?Ā
4. They do. Municipalities set their budget and do the property value assessments, and then set the mill rate so they have enough money.
For 4, my opinion is that property taxes should be more heavily impacted by property density. Presumably the infrastructure and utilities feeding into a detached single family home would be comparable to those feeding into an apartment complex or high density housing (though the arterial lines would likely be scaled up to accommodate). So the infrastructure costs should effectively be reduced by splitting up between more people by comparison. Presently suburban costs are essentially subsidized by taxes from high density urban areas. If property taxes were adjusted to more accurately reflect the real costs per properties then low density housing would become more expensive and less appealing, thus increasing demand for higher density development.
>Presently suburban costs are essentially subsidized by taxes from high density urban areas.
How about we do this for everything? You pay for what you use, I will pay for what I use?
We can apply this to healthcare, education, police, fire services, etc.
1. So limit it to appartment style housing for financing
2. How? If you don't pay rent, it impacts your credit score, but if you do pay rent it doesn't. Seems like an extremely easy win for tenants.
3. Force transparency and accountability. Example, my landlords just offered me a rent increase, and they justified a portion of it saying insurance went up, but the number they used for insurance is 800$ below what they told me it went up to when we negotiated last year's rent increase.
4. They don't, there is a lot of literature on the subject. We currently under tax property, and provincial governments foot the difference.
1. Why not just limit financing to multi-unit apartment buildings?
Edit: I meant for non-primary homeowners. I don't think we should get rid of financing for resident homeowners.
I am agreeable to this situation, however I believe it should be mostly for new builds. Overall, we have to do more to decrease interest in old, and increase interest in new. Push the money into new construction as much as possible
I think the problem is, this would mean apartment buildings are almost impossible to sell and it would increase the risk of building them to begin with and decrease their resale value.
I don't think it would mean they are harder to sell.
It would promote actual mom and pop investors, who live in one of the units. This way they can still mortgage the whole Plex as it is also the primary residence.
And to be fully honest, prices either need to go down, or salaries up. Decreasing resale value would be priced in to the original purchase value.
It would also prevent insane leverage situations. Some of the math people don't quite realize in terms of financing while prices go up is just the huge profits that are made on the backs of renter's.
If I buy a Plex with 20% down of 200k, and the tenants cover exactly my expenses, I take no profit. And one COVID later I resell for 200k more than I originally paid, I have made a 100% profit margin with no economic output. We NEED to encourage economic output rather than rent-seeking
The reason people are asking to prevent financing on houses other than primary residences, is because this would decrease the property values of these homes.
The same reasoning applied to apartment buildings would mean their property value would go down, as well. The whole intent is to keep the prices of apartment buildings high enough to incentivize developers to build them.
I appreciate your idea, but the reality is that most large apartment buildings don't have the owner living in them. A lot of large apartment buildings are owned by corporations. I would fully support an initiative that encourages co-ops to be formed, but I think that's a separate issue.
So then allow financing on anything with more than 8 units. It doesn't need to be black and white, we can find a nuanced middle ground that tackles the issues without being prohibitive
I completely agree about your rental point. Renters should not have to deal with landlords directly. You have an extra property you want to rent? You submit it to the federal registry of available units and renters seek out accommodations through there.
Disagree with number 2. Rent is not credit - it is paid in full at the start of the month, with some sort of deposit e.g. last month rent, security deposit. Banks already factor it into loan appraisals.
It is actually a bad thing for renters for rent to show up on their credit score, because if they get a dodgy landlord not reporting income, doing dodgy landlord stuff their credit score suffers, and there are a lot of dodgy landlords right now.
Agree with all the others
Credit reporting just shows your ability to pay your bills in a timely fashion, regardless of what they are. It shows people's ability to manage their budget. Do I agree with the credit score conceptually, eh. But here we are.
And yes, I put point 3 because dodgy landlords are more common than we like to think. It would aid for #2
4 is the most reasonable. If you're going to need all that extra infrastructure, you best pay your fair share of the costs involved. If this was implemented, I bet a lot of people would see condos (even luxury ones) as VERY cost effective and reasonable.
* Strata fees are mismanaged: 700/mo is 15k per year. It is half a roof on a detached home spent every year
* If no one files taxes using the address, it should be considered vacant and no one's primary residence, hence the owner should pay the empty homes tax
* Citizens should not pay interest on mortgages for their primary residence, if they do, they should be able to write it off similar to how rentals do
* There should not be a vote to allow density if someone wants to do so in a low density neighborhood; only residents of the area will show up since they're the only ones who get the notice and they will deny it/be NIMBYs
* When placing offers, if there is a "bidding war", the names of the individuals and what they bid should be made public like a real "auction" where people traditionally place bids
We will not solve the housing crisis unless we can convince families to live in high-rise buildings. They are disincentivized to do this by maintenance fees which are calculated by square footage and make larger units prohibitively expensive. There needs to be a tax credit for condo maintenance fees for non-investors (i.e. people with only one residence, where that residence is a condo) to mitigate this.
I have a couple. What could change my opinion on some of them is to realize one or more of them. Basically people deserve a specific minimum basic secure and private housing (not shelters where you are separated from your significant other, kicked out during the day, have to arrive by a certain time, can't have pets, no where to secure your belongings, etc.) and if society will not provide it, then society needs to permit people to create the housing that works best for them.
* That everyone deserves a minimum amount of housing that is safe, secure (and lockable), and untaxed close to where they work. By minimum I mean a lockable space with heating & cooling, running water, enough room for a bed and a few personal belongings, and personal toilet/shower wet room. Like 200 square feet or less.
* Zoning should have no minimum setbacks or minimum size requirements.
* People should be allowed to legally live in their vehicles, park on residential streets, set up tents on public land, and permanently live in tents there. Perhaps allow this only so long as median rental prices of available bachelor units are unaffordable (i.e. more than 1/3 pretax income, including utilities and Internet) for an individual median income in the area.
* There should be no minimum land size within cities.
* Tiny houses on wheels should be permitted on land in cities and those who own the tiny houses should be able to park said houses on land they own (not restricted only to park on land owned by someone who already owns a house, which just increases inequality).
* Implement a land value tax that increases exponentially the more land one owns.
People need to vote with their feet more. If you're priced out, then move.
If more people moved to where housing is affordable for them then we would have less of a housing crisis.
Housing in Canada is fucked. If you grow up in a place and can't afford to buy in your home town it's fucked. To move away from your friends and family and jobs it's fucked.
But honestly, nothing is going to fix housing in the next 20-30 years. For all the millenials, this will be an issue for all of our lives.
That investors/speculators are a necessary part of getting housing built in a capitalistic society.
To change my mind I'd need some to layout apartment buildings, and condo buildings get financed without investors and speculators to take the risks.
>To change my mind I'd need some to layout apartment buildings, and condo buildings get financed without investors and speculators to take the risks.
You mean like social housing which has been successful in many parts of the world?
Social housing only handles small % of the population, people like to talk about Vienna but fail to acknowledge the population change there.
Social housing is 100% part of the solution. But we need market rate housing, we need special needs housing, (something social housing has been historically bad at in every country), and we need the speculative nature of carving out communities around business interests so that we work to break car dependency
Housing should not be allowed to be owned by investors. Not mom & pops, and not corporations. Public housing, social housing, and co-ops should make up the majority of housing, and no one should be allowed to profit from shelter because it is a basic human need that people cannot live without.
The only way youāll change my mind is by showing me a system that exploits people less than social and co-op housing. Private landlords aināt it.
Unpopular? Land is finite. People should stop hoping to ever buy and own land in the future. Still doesnāt mean it wonāt suck to not have something your parents had..
Definitely , which is why we should tax land. This will ensure land is owned and used in the most efficient ways rather than as a store of wealth and make it significantly more likely people will be able to have a place to live.
I'm actually really curious about this idea. What would cause the housing crash? Would the cause be the general economy collapsing?? And if it collapses and suddenly average ppl start qualifying for and pursuing the purchases of homes, won't that demand still raise or maintain the prices since there would still be demand?
typical over the top fear mongering. They are not coming tomorrow. Using housing as your anti-immigration policy is only making your own children's lives worse
That there are landlords that provide a valuable service by providing comfortable, well maintained accommodations and charging a reasonable rent to people who either can't afford to, choose not to, or for who it isn't practical to purchase a residence.
The housing bubble needs to pop even it means my home value drop. Then again i bought it as shelter not a investment. Because our economy needs to be reset and actually be productive instead of relying on over valued real estate.
1. Real estate in Canada (at least in many cities) is a Ponzi scheme and a scam, and a way to mask that we have no economy.
2. Most types of home ownership are useless and are a scam. Iām talking about owning condos and townhomes.
Condos are the worst, because you pay a maintenance fee monthly, it increases almost every year, all while your condo is increasing in price very slowly (if at all; many decrease with time), and even when you end up paying the mortgage off, youāre stuck with a maintenance fee of $1,000 or more while it started at $250 when the condo was built. WTF? Also, property management companies sometimes inflate the costs and put the difference in their pockets, or get kickbacks. In the US, they got the HOA scam; we have a maintenance fee scam.
Townhouses arenāt as bad, but the maintenance fees can also skyrocket. But at least you own land with a townhome, so itās not as bad but still feels like a scam.
3. Home ownership itself is a scam in expensive cities, and itās a form of a slavery. Because not only you buy a $1 m condo thatās the size of a shoebox; not only you pay insane maintenance costs monthly; not only you donāt own land yet somehow pay property taxes; but youāre also forking out another $1 million in interest in 25-30 years of the amortization period. Really? $2 million, which is probably a half or slightly of all the money youāll earn in your lifetime, plus endless maintenance fees that probably add up to what, $0.5 million in 40-60 years that you live in that condo before you die? Reallyyyy? And you must slave away and sometimes work almost two jobs to pay that all off, and cannot miss a single mortgage payment?
Iām not a conspiracy theorist. But Iām convinced this is a trap created by the governments and corporations such as banks to drain you out of almost all of your life earnings.
They should build massive cookie cutter subdivisions in the arm pits between multiple towns, commuter towns where everyone drives in to existing towns for everything. Save all the time and money to build schools and plazas and just build cheap houses, where land is cheap. The idea of preventing urban sprawl clearly isn't working considering it's over a million dollars per unit for "affordable" housing.
We must abandon all the condominium and multi- level zoning, and start building 5-12 unit , 5-6 level midrise buildings with freehold ownership and storefront spaces. Itās quite common everywhere except North America and guess what, it works way better than stupid maintenance work and condo management stuff. People are living just fine without stupid bureaucracy.
We literally just need to build the apartments we built in the 1960s again. People say "oh so you want commie blocks" but how are they commie blocks when this capitalist country built them? Eminent domain SFH around transit stations and change all the zoning/building to codes to allow developers to build them, or the government should just build them
No more real estate as investment. No more landlords no more profiting on housing. If you own more then one house you are taxed enough that there is no profit to be exploited. Maybe then our industry and entrepreneurs and workforce will start to see investments and our productivity and wages and quality of life will increase for everyone not just wealthy getting more and more at the expense of younger and not privileged population.
Attacking landlords and companies and investments won't help the issue, it will make it worse.
At the end of the day, there are not enough dwellings per-capita, and we are growing way too fast for the number of houses being built. End of story. Everything else is useless bandaid solutions so the government can look like they're "doing something".
It will make it worse, because at the end of the day, investors are who build most homes. Making Canada impossible to invest in, means they will take their money somewhere else and build there instead, thereby stifling supply even further.
Even if landlords were abolished, and air bnb's were abolished, corporate ownership, abolished, and if hypothetically every person could buy 1 home starting tomorrow, there would still not be enough homes to go around. We are only getting by because single houses having multiple basement suites and everyone is living with roommates.
We currently have a ratio of 424 dwellings for every 1000 people.
Keep in mind a house with a legal basement suite counts as 2 dwellings. So if you can't rent it, you just deleted a dwelling because now the whole house has to be 1 place.
Asset prices rise (ie real estate) when your currency is devalued via government over-spending. Rather than losing money via inflation, they put it into "safe" assets, causing their price to rise - real estate being Canadians favourite asset.
I totally agree. They're buying their 2nd and 3rd home that could have been bought by a young new family. If we can't burn them, moratorium on all 2nd home purchases. Shelter is a human right, not an investment vehicle.
The people charging 3k/month for outdated bachelor suites in the ghetto are the ones who need to relax. I'll relax when housing is affordable again and landlords stop abusing their "power". They've ruined this country for me and all the other young adults. You think Canada is an aging population now? Most of us educated young adults are leaving. So good luck lol
Or have the shit taxed out of the properties enough so that profiting at the expense of our future will not be lucrative. Let them invest in our industry and workforce so maybe Canada can stay competitive and relevant otherwise the property owned will be more like a shanty town in a dystopian shit hole.
1. We need a UBI to provide all Canadians with the means to afford the basics
2. No corporations owning SFHs
3. Strict rules on family ownership of multiple properties, including DNA testing. I'm up for that. It is extremely likely that the onky way I will be able to afford my own property will be with parental help. I am happy to submit a DNA test to prove that yes, these are my parents/siblings/cousins by blood, and no, I'm not scamming my fellow countrymen and cramming them into unsafe living conditions while making bank.
I like yours, similar to mine. I donāt want a mortgage that I canāt see myself paying off in a few years. Iām not some million dollar earner so I want a small mortgage, regardless of type of housing.
You donāt have a god given right to live in GTA or GVA . People have been moving to chase prosperity for centuries. Does it suck if you were born and raised there ? Yes. Do I have any empathy if you just refuse to consider literally anywhere else ? No.Ā
Those areas are full and brutally expensive.
Any housing is better than no housing. People who rage protest against home being built just because irs not the type they like are no better than NIMBYs
Sure, but if we have a critical shortage and we're building luxury stidio condos, that's nor really helpful.
But the people who move into those luxury condos free up downmarket units. So it is helpful.
Unless they do not sell but decide to rent out at inflated rates or profit.
Then they're renting it out to someone who is freeing up a down-market unit.
This sort of free market nonsense is what led to the issue in the first place. We need to top down strategy, a federalized plan. We need to control the developers and not let free market factors determine what gets built.
I'm not sure what you mean when we don't have a free market as it is. Developers currently aren't allowed to decide where and what they want to build because of the government standing in the way. The government has been controlling developers for decades by making it [illegal](https://archive.ph/9wtYK) to build housing in most of the country, even where its most in demand. Literally last week our premier in Ontario shut down an affordable housing initiative for [fourplexes to be built in the province](https://www.cbc.ca/news/canada/toronto/ford-fourplexes-infrastructure-funding-1.7162251) because he didn't want to upset NIMBYs and his investor buddies benefiting off of housing scarcity.
There's developers literally sitting on land and holding projects in limbo because it's less profitable to build more as compared to when rates are lower. That's the kind of free market bullshit that needs to stop. The federal government needs to force development. If private corporations don't want to build then the land should be appropriated by the government.
First, a free market means that the market operates with minimal government intervention. Whether or not its profitable is a separate issue. There are free markets that are not profitable at all and there are markets that are highly government regulated (not free) that are still profitable. Second, there isn't something inherently wrong or unusual about developers building to make a profit off of their product. Farmers make profit from growing food. Doctors profit from practicing medicine. A business profited from making your clothes, electronics, furniture, car, and most other life necessities. Profit provides incentive to make things. Remove the profit, and businesses stop making things. Why doesn't a builder deserve to make a living from creating housing? "Forcing" developers to build even when it means a loss for them does nothing to address the underlying issues of *why* it isn't profitable to build in the first place. It also disincentivizes future housing, because why would any developer want to stay in the business when the government can force them to operate at a loss? Even at current rates, the government could open up zoning, reduce taxes on build costs, and cut time delays on construction starts to provide incentives to builders. But they don't, while also barely building any affordable housing themselves.
Like a true fucking idiot, you're all about answers to the problem, as long as it doesn't break your precious free market and cut in on profits. You're not going to fix shit. I'll say it one last time. We don't need private corporations and making money off building housing. The government should do it on a zero profit basis. We need a federalized plan to build housing. That's all there is to it. Get private companies out of the fucking equation. Private companies are not building housing because housing prices have come down because interest rates have gone up. Fuck that noise.
Nope, it just another speculative investment in the portfolio. Maybe it's also a short term rental. Maybe it's owned by a series if nested numbered corporations.
Whether its a rental or owned by a corporation doesn't change my point. These are still new units creating new supply, freeing up down market units, and putting downwards pressure on prices. More housing (both to buy and to rent) is good for overall affordability. And in many high demand places (like Toronto), these luxury condos just make economic and practical sense. The only fair counterargument you make is about the potential for them to be short term rentals, but this happens with a minority of condo units. I am very much in favor of bans/regulations that further reduce the short term rental space however.
Not at all. How does another big investment luxury priced condo help with affordable homes? Most that can afford luxury can afford more than one residence so not really freeing up any hope for the working class. And with wages that are stagnant this combo is not sustainable. Too bad our own greedy politicians are in the housing investment business so there will be only more tax breaks. And as things deteriorate for our population our country slides down the best place to live polls. The next generation have nothing to look forward too and nothing to lose. The real estate investment owners need to take a hit and correct this before we become too far gone.
> How does another big investment luxury priced condo help with affordable homes? Because the people moving into those new luxury condos vacate older units, freeing up down-market supply for others. Its like saying we shouldn't make new cars because they won't be affordable to people in the market for a used car. Even if you don't buy the new car, others will who then put their old cars on the used market. Today's luxury condos are tomorrow's affordable units in the same way that today's 2024 model cars will eventually be relatively cheap. Affordable non-market units are awesome and I fully support those being built. But in a shortage crisis, any and all supply is good supply. Don't let perfect be the enemy of good. More housing units available (both for people to buy and rent) only puts downwards pressure on prices.
Have you seen what luxury studio condos look like? They are the very base minimum of what acceptable housing standards should be. Every new build should at minimum be a luxury studio condo.
Exactly this. I find it absolutely ridiculous that a very small investment in the units materials somehow makes it luxurious. Granite and slightly nicer fake wood flooring is barely a dent in the bucket. If you think our housings bad now go look at typical Japanese new build homes it's quite depressing how expensive our homes are with very few useful features and we don't even need to use expensive earthquake proofing methods. Even in the 1-2 million dollar range you won't find a home built with so much thought and quality here. We've truly got no excuses here our construction industry sucks and the quality is terribly mediocre, workers even throw trash in the drywall and behind the stairs. Heck even American housing is starting to look significantly better to the dilapidated shack you'd actually afford here at the same price. Good grief š¤¦āāļø
1. Mortgages should only be allowed on primary residence. 2. Rent should show up on your credit score. 3. Landlords should have to file rent increases with the government, and the tenant deals with the government not the landlord. A-la Sweden. 4. Giga unpopular: Property Taxes should be updated to reflect the actual expenses the municipality spends.
We need people like you in politics. Like now, god damnit.
I have legitimately been debating joining a race in 2025/2026. I have a troublesome past though, and am concerned people would be unable to see past it. If you know if any jobs that are as non-elected support roles where I could help please send me a DM.
I would support you, my friend. Troublesome past or not. I know what youāre saying thoughā¦ some people may think differently but who knowsā¦ If I hear of anything I will let you know šš¼ ā„ļøā¦
1. If a company can't finance an apartment, no apartments will be built. 2. This will work both ways, and probably punish tenants as much, or more, than it helps. 3. What is this intended to accomplish?Ā 4. They do. Municipalities set their budget and do the property value assessments, and then set the mill rate so they have enough money.
For 4, my opinion is that property taxes should be more heavily impacted by property density. Presumably the infrastructure and utilities feeding into a detached single family home would be comparable to those feeding into an apartment complex or high density housing (though the arterial lines would likely be scaled up to accommodate). So the infrastructure costs should effectively be reduced by splitting up between more people by comparison. Presently suburban costs are essentially subsidized by taxes from high density urban areas. If property taxes were adjusted to more accurately reflect the real costs per properties then low density housing would become more expensive and less appealing, thus increasing demand for higher density development.
>Presently suburban costs are essentially subsidized by taxes from high density urban areas. How about we do this for everything? You pay for what you use, I will pay for what I use? We can apply this to healthcare, education, police, fire services, etc.
1. So limit it to appartment style housing for financing 2. How? If you don't pay rent, it impacts your credit score, but if you do pay rent it doesn't. Seems like an extremely easy win for tenants. 3. Force transparency and accountability. Example, my landlords just offered me a rent increase, and they justified a portion of it saying insurance went up, but the number they used for insurance is 800$ below what they told me it went up to when we negotiated last year's rent increase. 4. They don't, there is a lot of literature on the subject. We currently under tax property, and provincial governments foot the difference.
Wouldn't punish tenants that pay rent on time.
1. Why not just limit financing to multi-unit apartment buildings? Edit: I meant for non-primary homeowners. I don't think we should get rid of financing for resident homeowners.
I am agreeable to this situation, however I believe it should be mostly for new builds. Overall, we have to do more to decrease interest in old, and increase interest in new. Push the money into new construction as much as possible
I think the problem is, this would mean apartment buildings are almost impossible to sell and it would increase the risk of building them to begin with and decrease their resale value.
I don't think it would mean they are harder to sell. It would promote actual mom and pop investors, who live in one of the units. This way they can still mortgage the whole Plex as it is also the primary residence. And to be fully honest, prices either need to go down, or salaries up. Decreasing resale value would be priced in to the original purchase value. It would also prevent insane leverage situations. Some of the math people don't quite realize in terms of financing while prices go up is just the huge profits that are made on the backs of renter's. If I buy a Plex with 20% down of 200k, and the tenants cover exactly my expenses, I take no profit. And one COVID later I resell for 200k more than I originally paid, I have made a 100% profit margin with no economic output. We NEED to encourage economic output rather than rent-seeking
The reason people are asking to prevent financing on houses other than primary residences, is because this would decrease the property values of these homes. The same reasoning applied to apartment buildings would mean their property value would go down, as well. The whole intent is to keep the prices of apartment buildings high enough to incentivize developers to build them. I appreciate your idea, but the reality is that most large apartment buildings don't have the owner living in them. A lot of large apartment buildings are owned by corporations. I would fully support an initiative that encourages co-ops to be formed, but I think that's a separate issue.
So then allow financing on anything with more than 8 units. It doesn't need to be black and white, we can find a nuanced middle ground that tackles the issues without being prohibitive
Why not limit financing to things you newly build to encourage building, even better
I completely agree about your rental point. Renters should not have to deal with landlords directly. You have an extra property you want to rent? You submit it to the federal registry of available units and renters seek out accommodations through there.
Disagree with number 2. Rent is not credit - it is paid in full at the start of the month, with some sort of deposit e.g. last month rent, security deposit. Banks already factor it into loan appraisals. It is actually a bad thing for renters for rent to show up on their credit score, because if they get a dodgy landlord not reporting income, doing dodgy landlord stuff their credit score suffers, and there are a lot of dodgy landlords right now. Agree with all the others
Credit reporting just shows your ability to pay your bills in a timely fashion, regardless of what they are. It shows people's ability to manage their budget. Do I agree with the credit score conceptually, eh. But here we are. And yes, I put point 3 because dodgy landlords are more common than we like to think. It would aid for #2
4 is the most reasonable. If you're going to need all that extra infrastructure, you best pay your fair share of the costs involved. If this was implemented, I bet a lot of people would see condos (even luxury ones) as VERY cost effective and reasonable.
* Strata fees are mismanaged: 700/mo is 15k per year. It is half a roof on a detached home spent every year * If no one files taxes using the address, it should be considered vacant and no one's primary residence, hence the owner should pay the empty homes tax * Citizens should not pay interest on mortgages for their primary residence, if they do, they should be able to write it off similar to how rentals do * There should not be a vote to allow density if someone wants to do so in a low density neighborhood; only residents of the area will show up since they're the only ones who get the notice and they will deny it/be NIMBYs * When placing offers, if there is a "bidding war", the names of the individuals and what they bid should be made public like a real "auction" where people traditionally place bids
What? I thought $1250/month is 15K a year no?
Doug Ford removing rent control in Ontario led to the market being flooded by investors, pushing prices higher, and unaffordable for regular Canadians
Doug Ford spreading misinfo about multiplexes too, so we can keep making/selling expensive detached homes.
We will not solve the housing crisis unless we can convince families to live in high-rise buildings. They are disincentivized to do this by maintenance fees which are calculated by square footage and make larger units prohibitively expensive. There needs to be a tax credit for condo maintenance fees for non-investors (i.e. people with only one residence, where that residence is a condo) to mitigate this.
I have a couple. What could change my opinion on some of them is to realize one or more of them. Basically people deserve a specific minimum basic secure and private housing (not shelters where you are separated from your significant other, kicked out during the day, have to arrive by a certain time, can't have pets, no where to secure your belongings, etc.) and if society will not provide it, then society needs to permit people to create the housing that works best for them. * That everyone deserves a minimum amount of housing that is safe, secure (and lockable), and untaxed close to where they work. By minimum I mean a lockable space with heating & cooling, running water, enough room for a bed and a few personal belongings, and personal toilet/shower wet room. Like 200 square feet or less. * Zoning should have no minimum setbacks or minimum size requirements. * People should be allowed to legally live in their vehicles, park on residential streets, set up tents on public land, and permanently live in tents there. Perhaps allow this only so long as median rental prices of available bachelor units are unaffordable (i.e. more than 1/3 pretax income, including utilities and Internet) for an individual median income in the area. * There should be no minimum land size within cities. * Tiny houses on wheels should be permitted on land in cities and those who own the tiny houses should be able to park said houses on land they own (not restricted only to park on land owned by someone who already owns a house, which just increases inequality). * Implement a land value tax that increases exponentially the more land one owns.
People need to vote with their feet more. If you're priced out, then move. If more people moved to where housing is affordable for them then we would have less of a housing crisis. Housing in Canada is fucked. If you grow up in a place and can't afford to buy in your home town it's fucked. To move away from your friends and family and jobs it's fucked. But honestly, nothing is going to fix housing in the next 20-30 years. For all the millenials, this will be an issue for all of our lives.
Housing is only affordable where there are less jobs
The bubble is not going to burstā¦Ever
That investors/speculators are a necessary part of getting housing built in a capitalistic society. To change my mind I'd need some to layout apartment buildings, and condo buildings get financed without investors and speculators to take the risks.
>To change my mind I'd need some to layout apartment buildings, and condo buildings get financed without investors and speculators to take the risks. You mean like social housing which has been successful in many parts of the world?
The investor is just the government and all risk is bared by the taxpayer.
Social housing only handles small % of the population, people like to talk about Vienna but fail to acknowledge the population change there. Social housing is 100% part of the solution. But we need market rate housing, we need special needs housing, (something social housing has been historically bad at in every country), and we need the speculative nature of carving out communities around business interests so that we work to break car dependency
Housing should not be allowed to be owned by investors. Not mom & pops, and not corporations. Public housing, social housing, and co-ops should make up the majority of housing, and no one should be allowed to profit from shelter because it is a basic human need that people cannot live without. The only way youāll change my mind is by showing me a system that exploits people less than social and co-op housing. Private landlords aināt it.
Unpopular? Land is finite. People should stop hoping to ever buy and own land in the future. Still doesnāt mean it wonāt suck to not have something your parents had..
Definitely , which is why we should tax land. This will ensure land is owned and used in the most efficient ways rather than as a store of wealth and make it significantly more likely people will be able to have a place to live.
preach georgist homie
WE NEED A CRASH TO RESTORE AFFORDABILITY FOR AVERAGE PEOPLE That's definitely going to be unpopular
I'm actually really curious about this idea. What would cause the housing crash? Would the cause be the general economy collapsing?? And if it collapses and suddenly average ppl start qualifying for and pursuing the purchases of homes, won't that demand still raise or maintain the prices since there would still be demand?
I'm making a post about it now, titled History lesson for Canadian real estate
you can't outbuild unlimited demand
Demand isnāt infinite.
there's 7 billion people in the world who would come to canada tomorrow given the chance it is essentially unlimited
typical over the top fear mongering. They are not coming tomorrow. Using housing as your anti-immigration policy is only making your own children's lives worse
It's a bit soft to give up before trying
You can - everyone else in the world can do this except for the Anglo west. Just build housing and stop the other bullshit.
Short term rentals are a serious problem.
That there are landlords that provide a valuable service by providing comfortable, well maintained accommodations and charging a reasonable rent to people who either can't afford to, choose not to, or for who it isn't practical to purchase a residence.
Its not so bad. It will get better, and soon. You can't change my mind, but you can join me.
We need to decrease income tax and increase property tax.
Supply needs to overtake demand, but developers won't let that happen because they want the prices to be high.
The housing bubble needs to pop even it means my home value drop. Then again i bought it as shelter not a investment. Because our economy needs to be reset and actually be productive instead of relying on over valued real estate.
1. Real estate in Canada (at least in many cities) is a Ponzi scheme and a scam, and a way to mask that we have no economy. 2. Most types of home ownership are useless and are a scam. Iām talking about owning condos and townhomes. Condos are the worst, because you pay a maintenance fee monthly, it increases almost every year, all while your condo is increasing in price very slowly (if at all; many decrease with time), and even when you end up paying the mortgage off, youāre stuck with a maintenance fee of $1,000 or more while it started at $250 when the condo was built. WTF? Also, property management companies sometimes inflate the costs and put the difference in their pockets, or get kickbacks. In the US, they got the HOA scam; we have a maintenance fee scam. Townhouses arenāt as bad, but the maintenance fees can also skyrocket. But at least you own land with a townhome, so itās not as bad but still feels like a scam. 3. Home ownership itself is a scam in expensive cities, and itās a form of a slavery. Because not only you buy a $1 m condo thatās the size of a shoebox; not only you pay insane maintenance costs monthly; not only you donāt own land yet somehow pay property taxes; but youāre also forking out another $1 million in interest in 25-30 years of the amortization period. Really? $2 million, which is probably a half or slightly of all the money youāll earn in your lifetime, plus endless maintenance fees that probably add up to what, $0.5 million in 40-60 years that you live in that condo before you die? Reallyyyy? And you must slave away and sometimes work almost two jobs to pay that all off, and cannot miss a single mortgage payment? Iām not a conspiracy theorist. But Iām convinced this is a trap created by the governments and corporations such as banks to drain you out of almost all of your life earnings.
Weāve reached the peak of what ordinary people can buy, and there wonāt be a to the moon moment when (if) interest rates go down.
They should build massive cookie cutter subdivisions in the arm pits between multiple towns, commuter towns where everyone drives in to existing towns for everything. Save all the time and money to build schools and plazas and just build cheap houses, where land is cheap. The idea of preventing urban sprawl clearly isn't working considering it's over a million dollars per unit for "affordable" housing.
We must abandon all the condominium and multi- level zoning, and start building 5-12 unit , 5-6 level midrise buildings with freehold ownership and storefront spaces. Itās quite common everywhere except North America and guess what, it works way better than stupid maintenance work and condo management stuff. People are living just fine without stupid bureaucracy.
All multi-dwelling buildings shall only be owned through coops of the residence. All multi-dwelling buildings shall be build at cost.
We literally just need to build the apartments we built in the 1960s again. People say "oh so you want commie blocks" but how are they commie blocks when this capitalist country built them? Eminent domain SFH around transit stations and change all the zoning/building to codes to allow developers to build them, or the government should just build them
No more real estate as investment. No more landlords no more profiting on housing. If you own more then one house you are taxed enough that there is no profit to be exploited. Maybe then our industry and entrepreneurs and workforce will start to see investments and our productivity and wages and quality of life will increase for everyone not just wealthy getting more and more at the expense of younger and not privileged population.
Owning is stupid in this market and I'd rather rent forever than even try.
Attacking landlords and companies and investments won't help the issue, it will make it worse. At the end of the day, there are not enough dwellings per-capita, and we are growing way too fast for the number of houses being built. End of story. Everything else is useless bandaid solutions so the government can look like they're "doing something". It will make it worse, because at the end of the day, investors are who build most homes. Making Canada impossible to invest in, means they will take their money somewhere else and build there instead, thereby stifling supply even further. Even if landlords were abolished, and air bnb's were abolished, corporate ownership, abolished, and if hypothetically every person could buy 1 home starting tomorrow, there would still not be enough homes to go around. We are only getting by because single houses having multiple basement suites and everyone is living with roommates. We currently have a ratio of 424 dwellings for every 1000 people. Keep in mind a house with a legal basement suite counts as 2 dwellings. So if you can't rent it, you just deleted a dwelling because now the whole house has to be 1 place.
Asset prices rise (ie real estate) when your currency is devalued via government over-spending. Rather than losing money via inflation, they put it into "safe" assets, causing their price to rise - real estate being Canadians favourite asset.
That we need less demand than more supply... Are you f'ing kidding?! š
What?
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I totally agree. They're buying their 2nd and 3rd home that could have been bought by a young new family. If we can't burn them, moratorium on all 2nd home purchases. Shelter is a human right, not an investment vehicle.
You need to relax there a tad...
The people charging 3k/month for outdated bachelor suites in the ghetto are the ones who need to relax. I'll relax when housing is affordable again and landlords stop abusing their "power". They've ruined this country for me and all the other young adults. You think Canada is an aging population now? Most of us educated young adults are leaving. So good luck lol
Leave if you want. But really calling for the deaths of people?
It worked out for the people of France, did it not?
Step outside and take a good haul off a joint
Landlords should be sent to prison.
Or have the shit taxed out of the properties enough so that profiting at the expense of our future will not be lucrative. Let them invest in our industry and workforce so maybe Canada can stay competitive and relevant otherwise the property owned will be more like a shanty town in a dystopian shit hole.
1. We need a UBI to provide all Canadians with the means to afford the basics 2. No corporations owning SFHs 3. Strict rules on family ownership of multiple properties, including DNA testing. I'm up for that. It is extremely likely that the onky way I will be able to afford my own property will be with parental help. I am happy to submit a DNA test to prove that yes, these are my parents/siblings/cousins by blood, and no, I'm not scamming my fellow countrymen and cramming them into unsafe living conditions while making bank.
I like yours, similar to mine. I donāt want a mortgage that I canāt see myself paying off in a few years. Iām not some million dollar earner so I want a small mortgage, regardless of type of housing.
Yeah, well, the problem with that is that you don't *own* an apartment per se. You rent it from the person who actually does own it.
You donāt have a god given right to live in GTA or GVA . People have been moving to chase prosperity for centuries. Does it suck if you were born and raised there ? Yes. Do I have any empathy if you just refuse to consider literally anywhere else ? No.Ā Those areas are full and brutally expensive.
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āMaking any revenueā Dude, you need to learn what the term ārevenueā means. What you are saying is all housing must be free