95 Percent of Canadians Agree Country Is in Housing Crisis

Homes under construction in a new suburb in Ottawa, on Oct. 15, 2021. The Canadian Press/Adrian Wyld

Virtually all Canadians say they believe the country is in the midst of a housing crisis, with 69 percent strongly agreeing with the statement and 26 percent saying they somewhat agree.

In the new IPSOS poll, which surveyed 1,001 Canadians, just 4 percent disagreed that too many people cannot afford home ownership in Canada.

The survey also asked which level of government they thought was primarily responsible for the housing crisis, and 46 percent answered the federal government. At the same time, 26 percent said the responsibility lies with the provincial governments, and 8 percent said municipal governments.

When it came to who should take the lead in addressing the housing crisis, 46 percent answered the federal government, 26 percent said provincial governments, and 7 percent said municipal governments. One in five said they were unsure who was to blame or who should be responsible for addressing housing challenges.

Housing affordability has been a priority for the Liberal government in the last few years, as the issue rose in importance to Canadians. Rising inflation and interest rates since 2022 have hurt housing affordability, while at the same time the federal government rapidly increased immigration, boosting Canada’s population from 38 million in July 2020 to an estimated 41.7 million in October 2024, before announcing slight restrictions to its immigration policies.

The Parliamentary Budget Officer recently reported that an estimated 2.6 million Canadian households will be in need of new housing by 2027, while 2.4 million households are already in “core housing need” because their home is either in need of major repairs, does not have enough bedrooms for the household size, or costs them 30 percent or more of their before-tax income.

Ottawa has introduced several policies relating to increasing available housing, such as adding $15 billion to the apartment construction loan financing program, putting an additional $400 million into the Housing Accelerator Fund, and introducing a Tax-Free First Home Savings Account.

The recently-introduced Fall Economic Statment included measures based on housing affordability, such as launching consultations to examine the barriers to offering long-term fixed-rate mortgages, doubling loan limits for secondary suite programs to $80,000, and fighting mortgage fraud by implementing income verification through the Canada Revenue Agency.

The Conservatives have proposed fixing Canada’s housing crisis by rewarding cities that remove “gatekeepers” to new homes and meet homebuilding targets. They would provide building bonuses, withhold transit and infrastructure funding from cities that do not build sufficient high-density housing around transit, and cut bonuses and salaries of Canada Mortgage and Housing Corporation executives if they cannot speed up approval applications for housing programs to an average of 60 days.

The Conservatives also proposed removing the GST from new homes, listing 15 percent of the federal government’s 37,000 buildings, and appropriating federal land to be turned into housing.