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Waiving the GST was just a start. These 3 ideas could help get more housing built in Canada (www.cbc.ca)
submitted 2 years ago by to c/canada@lemmy.ca
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From faster approvals to hiring more workers, governments need to step up: experts

Peter Armstrong · CBC News

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[–] 15 points 2 years ago (5 children)

Don't need to build as many houses if you remove the speculators buying them out and renting them out for a premium, Building more home right now will disproportionately help realtors, and speculators more than anyone.

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  • [–] 6 points 2 years ago (1 child)

    Vacancy is pretty much zero across the major Canadian cities. We have the lowest housing per capita in the G7. There is objectively not enough housing in Canada and it’s absolutely delusional to say otherwise. Is this wishful thinking just a form of NIMBYism? Do you own a SFH and you want to “preserve the character” of your neighbourhood or something?

    Where are you getting that building more homes will disproportionately help realtors and speculators? Even non-market housing, like co-ops and social housing? How in the world does that even work?? Why would speculators like that? I hate speculators, but your theory makes no sense whatsoever!

    There is not a single urban economist, right or left, who agrees with you. With beliefs like this so widespread, it’s no wonder we don’t enact any policies to actually help with the housing crisis.

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  • [–] 5 points 2 years ago (2 children)

    The point is that landlords and speculators drive up costs - period. If you want to ease the housing crisis you could in theory build you're way out of it. You could also bale water out of a boat while it's sinking. Now what if you plug the hole while bailing out the water?

    Speculators are the fucking hole. Want a second home? Cool. Make them pay 20%+ tax on it a la Singapore:

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  • [–] 3 points 2 years ago (1 child)

    I am in support of any measures to make the lives of speculators and investors miserable but even the graphic you share endorses increasing housing supply! Singapore is famously super YIMBY and builds tons of public and market housing.

    Frankly, whatever else we do, there is NO solution without significantly more supply. Yes, let’s change our tax code to stamp out speculation, but it will take years, if not decades, to catch up on building enough supply even if we make changes now.

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  • [–] 3 points 2 years ago

    Of course. Purely based on numbers we need more units. But again, if we build more it's going to help speculators more than FTHB unless you over build. So you're just growing the wealth divide.

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  • [–] 2 points 2 years ago (1 child)

    There are already tax discounts on primary residence, there's a capital gains exemption. Doesn't matter because housing prices still go up too much. And why do they keep going up? Hmm... maybe something about a shortage of housing?

    Speculators can't single handedly increase the price because they still need someone to buy or rent the property for a worthwhile price.

    There are areas where housing prices stagnate and it's not like some speculators can just go in there and force prices to go up.

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  • [–] 2 points 2 years ago

    Not sure what point you are trying to make? What does capital gains exemption have to do with anything? If anything we should follow the US and only exempt a base amount.

    I'm saying use taxes to disincentivize speculation.

    There's a reason the market became detached from fundamentals when rates were lowered. I'm not saying we don't need to build more. Of course we do. But I'd rather not build homes that go to more investors than FTHB like is currently happening. Otherwise the situation only gets better if you over build.

    Also yes, it only takes a small number of speculators to create unaffordable housing. Real estate is a market based on benchmarks. You should look into the history of the BC market and how a small number of speculators drove that market bananas.

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  • [–] 4 points 2 years ago (1 child)

    This is part of the problem, like AirBnB, but it's not a 3,500,000 unit problem.

    Also, no realtors involved on new builds.

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  • [–] 2 points 2 years ago*

    They are involved in assignment sales a lot of the time though.

    Given that speculators and now a larger segment of the market than FTHB, I think making a 3,500,000 unit problem a 2,.000,000 unit problem, while also driving down rents is a huge fucking win.

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  • [–] 4 points 2 years ago (1 child)

    Yes you do. Population growth went up. Housing starts went down. That's what created the shortage that speculators are capitalizing on.

    Do people hoard food when there isn't a food shortage? And if they do, is it even a problem?

    The shortage is what gives the profiteers and gougers their power.

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  • [–] -1 points 2 years ago* (last edited 2 years ago)

    The goal of building enough homes to have an OVER supply (a la Japan) is virtually impossible in the next two decades. So why not deal with the fact that speculators now outnumber first time home buyers and make them pay a huge flat tax beyond a primary residence?

    The idea that we'll simply build out way out of a crisis 10+ years in the making while importing millions more people at the same time is laughable. It's also going deepen the wealth divide even more.

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