I am concerned that the Ontario government has supported housing policies that will approve more housing but will do little to address affordability or get shovels in the ground. There focus has been on municipal approvals but municipalities don’t build housing.
Concurrent with supply issues, new home construction is also subject to increasingly more stringent energy code requirements. I have heard that the most recent STEP code introduced in BC in May 2023 will, on average, require an additional $70,000 in material cost and this is just for the additional insulation. Then throw in more requirements for very complex building envelope - it's technically very difficult to implement successfully (new standards/ lack of tested/time proven construction assemblies and procedures). This imposes additional risk for the contractor and the most direct way to deal with this is to increase cost. As a structural engineer, I have seen a disturbing decline in construction quality over the past 3 years - and this is concurrent with BC Building Code imposed construction standards that are moving in the exact opposite direction. It's not working.
News Flash. We ARE in a housing crisis. Right now. Not everything is about the commodification of housing. People need affordable homes to live in. Rate hikes are not working. The greed around buying and selling is going to push all of us off a cliff.
So if you imagine that existing mortgage holders and new owners are going to choose to rent instead of buying. That's the theory. Where will they live with rental vacancies so low? Really our housing policies are headed for a crisis.
I am concerned that the Ontario government has supported housing policies that will approve more housing but will do little to address affordability or get shovels in the ground. There focus has been on municipal approvals but municipalities don’t build housing.
Concurrent with supply issues, new home construction is also subject to increasingly more stringent energy code requirements. I have heard that the most recent STEP code introduced in BC in May 2023 will, on average, require an additional $70,000 in material cost and this is just for the additional insulation. Then throw in more requirements for very complex building envelope - it's technically very difficult to implement successfully (new standards/ lack of tested/time proven construction assemblies and procedures). This imposes additional risk for the contractor and the most direct way to deal with this is to increase cost. As a structural engineer, I have seen a disturbing decline in construction quality over the past 3 years - and this is concurrent with BC Building Code imposed construction standards that are moving in the exact opposite direction. It's not working.
News Flash. We ARE in a housing crisis. Right now. Not everything is about the commodification of housing. People need affordable homes to live in. Rate hikes are not working. The greed around buying and selling is going to push all of us off a cliff.
So if you imagine that existing mortgage holders and new owners are going to choose to rent instead of buying. That's the theory. Where will they live with rental vacancies so low? Really our housing policies are headed for a crisis.