How To Fix Canada’s Housing Crisis
It’s an election year and, for once, all our federal party leaders agree on something: Canada is in the throes of a debilitating housing crisis that’s wreaking political, economic and societal havoc. Forget buying a home—even rents are unaffordable for most Canadians. Where our politicians differ is on how to fix it. Pierre Poilievre wants to cut fees and taxes for building new homes, while the Liberals are offering cities millions of dollars to densify. Our response: all of the above, please. In fact, we’ve assembled 25 smart, surprising, common-sense solutions that will help us build homes fast, lower prices and cool down our blazing market. Some are futuristic, such as robot construction workers or massive 3D printers extruding entire houses. Others tackle big-picture policy, like how to fill labour shortages and free up more land for development. The one thing they have in common: they’re all absolutely achievable.
CASE STUDY
1. Build Tiny Homes Fast
In a parking lot in Gatineau, Quebec, a village of candy-hued shipping containers is pointing the way out of the homelessness crisis
Between 2018 and 2022, the number of people experiencing homelessness in the Outaouais region of Quebec shot up dramatically, leaving more than 700 people unhoused. Rock-bottom vacancy rates and the highest rents in Quebec converged to create an unprecedented crisis. As shelters overflowed, tent encampments mushroomed in parks throughout Gatineau, the largest city in the region.
In the fall of 2023, two people died at one encampment. That prompted Gatineau land developer Devcore Group to install 48 heated tents on a nearby hockey arena parking lot to get people out of the cold. The next year, Devcore upped its game. In collaboration with a non-profit called Transitiôn Québec, it transformed the site into one of Canada’s largest tiny-home communities, Village Transitiôn, on land donated by the city.
Just in time for Christmas, the first residents moved in. Today the site is a small village made up of 45 orange, mint-green and white shipping containers, with more on the way. The containers are intended to be transitional housing, with each resident staying for between one and five years. Units come in two formats: a 100-square-foot room with a single bed, sink, toilet and mini-fridge, or a 150-square-foot studio unit with a double bed, full kitchen, bathroom and terrace. All the units have running water, electricity and high-speed internet. The Village also offers an on-site intervention centre staffed by trained mental-health and addiction workers.
Tiny-home villages have emerged as a solution to Canada’s homelessness crisis. In Duncan, B.C., a 34-unit village was built on an unused lot owned by BC Housing in January of 2022. The next year, a 50-unit project opened on a municipal parking lot in downtown Peterborough, Ontario. In Saint John, New Brunswick, six temporary shipping containers, housing 14 people, cost just $150,000 to build. And last year in Victoria, B.C., a joint venture between the city, a local developer and an anti-
homelessness group created 30 single-person units on a city-owned parking lot.
The Gatineau village currently houses 82 people and, by the end of May, around 100 people are expected to live there. Other cities are already taking note: officials from Toronto, Montreal and Ottawa have been in touch with Transitiôn Québec to learn about its process.
BIG IDEA
2. Get Kids Into the Trades
Giving teens apprenticeships will fill our labour gaps and help build much-needed housing stock
Canada’s construction sector is facing a looming labour shortfall. Projections show that, by 2032, Canada will lose more than 245,000 construction workers due to retirement—and labour shortages are already impeding new builds, extending project timelines and increasing the cost of construction. Canada needs more skilled tradespeople to boost its lagging labour force. That means that now is a crucial time to build the next generation of apprentices.
For the last six years, I’ve worked as a recruiter for the Ontario Youth Apprenticeship Program, or OYAP, which focuses on helping high school students explore careers in the skilled trades. Through OYAP, students in high school programs complete placements throughout a semester, typically spending about two-thirds of their time on the job, earning credits and sometimes finding summer employment or full-time work after graduation.
I visit job sites and find students just beaming. They say, “I learned how to use a skill saw,” “I learned how to use a laser level,” or simply, “I built this.” One student told me about repairing a shower for a family. After the work was done, the student saw the immediate impact as the family returned. The sense of pride they find in their work almost brings a tear to my eye. And they graduate ready for real-world careers.
Programs like OYAP are making a difference, but more needs to be done. Last year, Ontario announced Focused Apprenticeship Skills Training, a new OYAP initiative to recognize students who get at least eight co-op credits. When they graduate, they’ll get a special seal on their diploma and be on a fast track to a rewarding career.
Decades ago, skilled trades were weighed down by stigma and seen as inferior career choices. I believe we’re past that now, but educators and the industry need to keep finding innovative ways to support young people who want to explore skilled trades. The future depends on it.
—Caterina Maietta, project leader, Ontario Youth apprenticeship program, Toronto Catholic District School Board
CASE STUDY
3. Turn Industrial Relics Into Housing
Canadian cities are full of derelict factories, warehouses and transportation infrastructure stations. Let’s put them back to work.
The future of housing is hiding in Canada’s abandoned industrial sites. Examples are everywhere: Winnipeg’s Galpern Building, which once housed a china wholesaler, was converted into a 30-unit residential complex in 2018. In Toronto, the Wychwood Barns, a decommissioned streetcar-maintenance facility, is now home to dozens of residents.
The most ambitious example in Canada right now is Toronto’s former Downsview Airport. The sprawling 370-acre site was formerly a Canadian Forces base; it was also a manufacturing hub for Bombardier aircraft. Now it’s being transformed into a mixed-use community for more than 54,000 residents. The $30-billion redevelopment will unfold over 30 years, creating seven distinct neighbourhoods with schools, community centres, parks and shopping. A former airport runway will become a pedestrian street running for two kilometres, flanked by mid-rise commercial buildings.
Reusing decommissioned spaces is more cost-effective than building new, and it’s more sustainable, too, reducing the need for new materials and lowering the carbon footprint of construction. At Downsview, the site’s industrial assets will be put to use: some building components will be assembled in former hangars, saving on transportation and labour costs.
Downsview will proceed in stages, with the first phase beginning construction in 2027, building 2,850 homes over four years. In the meantime, the developers are getting Torontonians accustomed to seeing the site as a neighbourhood and a destination. Aircraft hangars are being used for film production, and last summer the runway became a mini-golf course and a free drive-in movie theatre.
Most cities don’t have decommissioned airports to repurpose, but they all have obsolete industrial sites that are full of untapped potential. With smart planning, these relics can be turned into tomorrow’s new neighbourhoods.
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4. Automate the Red Tape
Edmonton’s population is booming, and city planners are keen to get shovels in the ground, but it was often taking weeks for the paperwork to go through. And so, last September, Edmonton became the first city in Canada to automate development permits for detached and semi-detached homes. Builders can fill out specs online—and begin construction the same day. The system has reduced administrative costs for both the city and developers, and plans are under way to expand the system to different types of housing. Other cities are catching the automation bug: Vancouver, Toronto and Calgary are all experimenting with tools to speed up permit approval.
BIG IDEA
5. Fill Up Canada’s Spare Bedrooms
The country’s surplus bedrooms are an untapped weapon in the fight against housing scarcity
Canada faces a shortfall of 3.1 million housing units—but we already have a partial solution right in front of us. Nationwide, Canadian homes have about 12 million spare bedrooms. Most aren’t being actively rented. Others are listed on platforms like Facebook Marketplace, Kijiji and Craigslist, where users are often at risk of encountering fraud or shady operators.
That’s why in 2021 I founded Sparrow, an online platform connecting owners of extra bedrooms to potential renters. Homeowners create a profile that covers their living preferences, household habits and lifestyle. Potential renters do the same. We have screening and background checks for safety. Then an algorithm suggests pairings, after which a team of employees refine them to make the best match.
Unlike Airbnb, we’re not filling spare rooms with short-term renters. We’re helping people find homes. To date, we’ve made more than 1,000 matches. One user, Charlene, moved from Hong Kong to study at the University of Toronto. She found Letty, a homeowner renting out extra bedrooms. Another international student, Daniela, took up the other bedroom, and all three live together in what Daniela now calls her second home.
There’s also Brigitte, a host from Toronto who heard on the news how difficult it was for young people to find affordable homes. After her son moved out, she rented the extra bedroom to a young woman in search of affordable housing. In another case, two retirees in Ottawa rented a spare bedroom to Goodness, a student from Nigeria. At $875 per month, it was far cheaper than the average one-bedroom in the city.
Most of Sparrow’s rentals are in Toronto and Vancouver, but we plan to expand and unlock 100,000 bedrooms nationwide by 2030. Of course, we’re just one platform. The potential is much larger. I’d like to see the federal government encourage homeowners to rent out vacant spaces through tax incentives. Cities could provide property-tax incentives, and universities could use this model to expand student housing options. After all, it’s a lot cheaper to fill an existing room than to build a new one.
—Oren Singer, CEO, Sparrow
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6. Predict Population Growth—Accurately
Last year, Canada’s population hit a whopping 41 million. The only problem? There weren’t enough places for everyone to live. The issue was a mismatch between projections and reality: in 2013, for example, Statistics Canada estimated that the population in 2023 would be just 38.7 million. That discrepancy caused developers and planners to radically underestimate the supply they needed to build. To fix this, governments need to change how they forecast growth, taking into account more dynamic data, such as rural-to-urban migration, family size and immigration targets.
Q&A
7. Take the Profit Out of Housing
European cities are building affordable public housing, supportive housing and co-ops faster, better and more beautifully than us. It’s time to catch up.
What does Europe have that Canada doesn’t? For starters: way more non-profit housing. Cities across the continent are building affordable public housing, supportive housing and co-ops faster, better and more beautifully than us, and Carolyn Whitzman, author of Home Truths: Fixing Canada’s Housing Crisis, says it’s time for Canada to catch up. Here, she explains how we can crib from Europe’s ambitious real-estate playbook.
What’s the difference between non-profit and market housing?
It’s as simple as housing for profit versus social good. I’m not saying private developers are evil, but when a market developer goes to a bank, the expectation is a return on investment. For a non-profit developer, the only expectations are that it will provide the housing units promised and not hemorrhage money. In Canada, less than four per cent of housing is non-profit. Across Europe, the average is almost twice that; in Austria and the Netherlands, about a quarter. My dream is to double our stock in the short term. Twenty per cent would be ideal.
How have other countries done it?
France is a good example. In 2000, the French government created a law that every municipality needed 20 per cent non-profit housing. Funding came from a revolving-loan fund for developers, in which interest and payments on loans are put back into new housing projects. It’s also funded by a small payroll tax on large companies. Today, some areas have a target of 25 per cent non-profit housing.
In Europe, non-profit housing is for people of all income levels. Why do Canadians think it’s mostly for low-income residents?
Some of that comes from an attitude that public housing is intended to be unpleasant so people want to move out. In Europe, there’s a lot of emphasis on design competitions. In Vienna, architects have designed wonderful buildings that specifically suit older people and single parents. In Paris, Helsinki, Hamburg and Munich, they include schools and parks and daycare centres. It’s community-building, not just housing-building.
What else can we steal from Europe?
In France and Finland, whether they’ve had left-wing or right-wing governments, they’ve stayed committed to their targets. And the main thing is to throw out our planning rule book and zoning, which has long prioritized single-family homes, and do what is necessary to make green, affordable communities.
What about funding?
Non-profit developers need dependable financing, which ideally would include something like revolving-loan funds. And let’s start being more creative! Remember Habitat 67 in Montreal? They took Moshe Safdie, a 25-year-old architect, and said, “Here’s some money—have at it.” That spirit of innovation is alive in a lot of countries, and it once existed here.
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8. Make Space For Asylum Seekers
In 2023, there were 143,000 asylum claims in Canada in 2023, an uptick of 57 per cent from the year before. Without homes or Canadian networks, these newcomers often end up in already crowded city homeless shelters: half of shelter occupants in Toronto in 2024 were refugee claimants, while in Peel Region, the number climbed as high as 75 per cent. In response, Peel has created the country’s largest reception centre: a $22-million facility with 680 dorm-style beds, showers, a kitchen and laundry facilities. A complex like the one in Peel can house an asylum seeker for $90 a day, compared to $220 for sheltering them in hotels.
BIG IDEA
9. Build on Parking Lots
Parking lots occupy massive swathes of valuable urban land. We need to reclaim it.
Imagine if an alien, watching us from space, heard that we didn’t have enough land for housing in our cities. They wouldn’t believe it. From above, much of our urban landscape appears empty. In new developments, we often allocate more land to surface parking than to homes. This is even common in some urban cores—nearly half the privately owned land in downtown Regina is used for parking. A simple but transformative housing solution is right in front of us: build on our parking lots.
We’ve already taken the first steps. Municipalities in Ontario have started upzoning malls and power centres, which include enormous parking lots. The federal government has released surplus lands—many of which are office buildings with sprawling parking lots—for housing and development. In Mississauga, Ontario, the 130-acre Square One district is undergoing a huge transformation, with thousands of residential units set to replace some of its 8,000 parking spaces. Last spring, the city of Toronto announced plans to develop up to 130 parking lots across the city to support housing. From a developer’s perspective, building on parking lots is a win-win. There’s no need to demolish existing homes or cut down mature trees. That means some of the usual hurdles to development—such as community backlash and environmental concerns—can be largely avoided.
There are right and wrong ways to do this, of course. If all we do is drop an apartment building onto an old shopping-mall lot, we aren’t creating a great neighbourhood. We need to create well-designed communities that are walkable, safe, near greenery and supported by transit, where people actually want to live.
And if we do that, every mid-sized and major city in Canada can benefit. Over time, the need for parking will decline, too. Dense neighbourhoods will allow errands to be done on foot, and households will need one car (or no cars) instead of two. Gradually, the cycle will shift from car dependency, and we won’t even miss those parking lots. It’s time to stop prioritizing empty asphalt and start building the communities we need.
—Dawn Parker, professor, school of planning, University of Waterloo
CASE STUDY
10. Make Laneways Livable
The underused alleyways in Canadian cities can be the next frontier for new housing
Many Canadian cities have two things in common: critically low housing stock and vast laneway networks. Compact, efficient laneway dwellings could turn this empty space into a housing solution.
Single-family housing has long been sacrosanct in Calgary—but last year, after days of intense debate, its city council narrowly approved a city-wide rezoning, permitting townhouses and laneway homes on what were single-family lots. The city is also waiving permit fees for laneway houses and other secondary suites until December of 2026. Homeowners can even put their address into an online tool and see what type of house their lot’s zoning will allow.
Mark Erickson is the co-founder of Studio North, a Calgary design firm that specializes in custom laneway houses. One of the company’s current developments, in the city’s Sunnyside neighbourhood, features buildings on either side of a block with a shared courtyard between. Each structure includes ground-floor units for seniors or people with mobility challenges and two-bedroom units above for young families or students. “These designs reflect how multi-generational families can live together, despite different needs,” said Erickson.
Multi-generational living is now the reality for more than one million Canadian households, and Studio North’s clients often build for extended families—aging parents, returning university students or live-in caregivers. Other buyers see these houses as investment opportunities, renting them out for additional income.
Though laneway houses are generally cheaper than other accommodations, they’re still not cheap to build, often requiring budgets of up to $500,000, plus approximately $50,000 in additional costs for design and engineering. But as they become more common, their impact on the housing stock will grow—as will their impact on neighbourhoods.
Smaller housing options may bring more renters and others into neighbourhoods that are otherwise filled with family-sized houses, filling laneways with front doors and porches. Ultimately, Erickson hopes to transform the city’s alleys from overlooked spaces into vibrant mini main streets.
BIG IDEA
11. Speed Up the Trains
High-speed rail can connect inexpensive communities to bustling urban labour markets
Long commutes are a fact of Canadian life. Some 1.5 million of us endure more than an hour of travel, each way, to work. But we make that sacrifice for access to the cheaper housing that only exists far from major urban centres. One way to speed up those long commutes—and open up even more housing in outlying communities—is high-speed rail, or HSR, a system of trains that can speed along at 300 kilometres per hour. HSR could rapidly connect job-rich urban centres with affordable but far-flung communities.
HSR is not new: Japan’s shinkansen bullet train has been around since 1964, and France’s double-deck TGV since 1981. Both exceed 300 kilometres per hour. At those speeds, the four-hour drive from Windsor to Toronto would take barely an hour. But HSR has never made inroads in Canada, despite politicians sporadically touting it.
Last year, things started to get on track: the federal government announced plans for HSR linking Toronto and Quebec City, with stops in-between. This February, they committed $3.9 billion to design the line over the next five years, after which construction will start. But with an election looming, the plan may soon rest with a new government, which could have different ideas, or balk at the long-term expense.
These challenges shouldn’t stop us. HSR drives economic activity in the areas it serves, provides low-emission travel and eases highway congestion. Crucially, HSR could make inexpensive communities accessible to commuters. An IT worker who earns $85,000 in Toronto could settle in Windsor and afford a $570,000 home. A couple in Ottawa making $120,000 combined could buy a $450,000 home in Kingston. By shifting demand, HSR could also ease housing pressure in urban cores.
It’s been at least a generation since we’ve built something of national significance, like the Canadarm or the Trans-Canada Highway. These reflected a willingness to incur great cost and plan a generation ahead. That’s what we need to build high-speed rail. Think of the old Greek proverb: “A society grows great when old men plant trees whose shade they shall never sit in.”
—Imran Abdool, lecturer, Ivey Business School, Western University, and Peter Voyer, associate professor, Odette School of Business, University of Windsor
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12. Make It Cheaper to Build New Housing
Creating a home from scratch costs more than just labour, materials and land—builders must pay millions in permit and zoning fees, on top of development fees to fund infrastructure and amenities. Lowering or eliminating some of these costs would spur developers to build more, faster. In Ontario, the city of Vaughan has made the decision to radically drop development charges back to 2018 rates. Mississauga is reducing development costs by up to 100 per cent for new three-bedroom rentals. And Toronto is waiving development charges for companies building rental housing, as long as their developments contain enough affordable units.
BIG IDEA
13. Open Up Public Land
Underused public land could house hundreds of thousands of Canadians—if governments make it accessible
In the 20th century, Canada was hugely successful at turning public land into housing for hundreds of thousands of people. Last year, the government resurrected the strategy, pledging to free up enough land to build 250,000 homes. These would be built on locations like former military sites, Canada Post properties and federal office buildings. That’s a big deal, accounting for nearly one-fifth of the 1.3 million additional homes the government says we need by 2030. Already, the feds have opened a number of properties, with space for several thousand housing units.
But two big things stand in the way of ramping up the plans any further. First, there’s no comprehensive data source for developers about where all that land is. Trying to find it means navigating systems riddled with barriers, with information fragmented between governments and private data providers. Second, much of the land is tied up in jurisdictional gridlock, which thwarts development.
Last fall, the federal government began addressing the first problem with its Canada Public Land Bank. It’s a good start, though it currently focuses only on surplus land. A much larger opportunity lies in underused land. For example: blocks from downtown Halifax, Canada Post operates a massive mail-sorting facility on 14 prime urban acres. The city has identified it as a growth area, but Canada Post has resisted moving from the urban core. This leads to the second barrier: jurisdictional wrangling and disagreement.
To solve both problems, the governments need to take the lead. The feds must establish processes to help public agencies and governments collaborate on land use, and all governments need to tear down barriers to information. B.C. is a great example of how to do this: the province standardizes how municipalities track land and provides an open database. This would be a game-changer in areas like the GTA, where data is managed inconsistently between municipalities.
Canada’s public land is an incredible resource. With the right leadership and collaboration, it can once again become a cornerstone of Canada’s housing strategy.
—James Connolly, associate professor of urban studies, University of British Columbia
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14. Reward Cities for Building Up
Canadian cities have lots of reasons to steer away from density: cranky NIMBYs, strains on infrastructure and the administrative headache of changing zoning. The best way to combat this is to reward cities that make it easier to build big—with cold hard cash. The federal government’s Housing Accelerator Fund, for example, has committed $4 billion to cities that rezone residential land for greater density. So far the feds have made agreements with two dozen municipalities. They include Toronto, which received $471 million to build an extra 11,780 homes, and Edmonton, which got $175 million to build 5,200.
Q&A
15. Make Way for Greenfields
Not everyone wants (or can afford) to live in big cities. Luckily, there’s plenty of land right next door.
Frank Clayton, a senior research fellow at Toronto Metropolitan University’s Centre for Urban Research and Land Development, says Canada would be wise to make better use of its vast greenfields, also known as the vacant plots abutting urban centres. Clayton’s caveat? Expand responsibly.
What is greenfield development?
Greenfield refers to any vacant land that surrounds a built-up urban area. Think of the roads you see at the edge of a city: one side’s got a shopping centre, and the other side is farmland. That’s greenfield.
Isn’t developing that land just urban sprawl? Does it worsen congestion and pollution, and encroach on natural areas?
Back when I worked at the CMHC, sprawl was used to describe “leapfrog development”—where new developments weren’t right next to a city but kilometres away, far from urban boundaries. You’d have to set up all-new sewers, roads and so on, rather than just extending existing servicing. That’s sprawl, so calling greenfield sprawl is a misnomer. And of course people are concerned about farmland and the environment. But if Canadians aren’t able to live in detached houses anymore, then the conversation changes.
Can you give me an example of the platonic ideal of a greenfield development?
Kanata, just outside of Ottawa, was built to be what planners call a complete community. It has huge business space to support the tech industry, and all kinds of retail. It’s vibrant now. Planners have been doing this for years. They include retail, schools, hopefully some office development if they can get it. They don’t just plan for housing; they plan for a community.
How would you reassure urban dwellers who might want to move to a greenfield area but are concerned they’ll be out in the middle of nowhere?
In Ontario in particular, we’ve been expanding into land next to built-up areas, which means residents are fairly close to most amenities. And even in terms of work, there’s been a shift in the amount of days people are required to be in the office, and many companies are setting up satellite offices in suburban business parks. People who live farther out are driving there instead of downtown.
What was your take on the controversy over developing Toronto’s Greenbelt?
Well, in York Region, there are GO stations in the Greenbelt. What if we developed around those, right up against the Greenbelt boundary? That would work because you could extend services and build houses quickly. It wouldn’t reduce the Greenbelt, because you could extend it farther out. It makes sense to allow some housing there, if it’s done properly. Homebuyers prefer ground-oriented housing, and if they can’t find it centrally, they’ll keep spreading out.
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16. Make Apartments Bigger
Canada’s housing shortage is especially difficult for families, with housing starts dominated by small apartments and condos. One fix? Rezone single-family neighbourhoods for duplexes, triplexes and fourplexes. These reduce the need for sprawl and provide space for families to breathe. Another idea: make apartments family-friendly. B.C. has taken the lead, last year legalizing “single-stair” buildings, with one exit per floor rather than two. Single-stair designs are common in Europe and Asia, where the additional floor space allows larger units and more flexibility with layouts. Other provinces are now looking to follow suit.
BIG IDEA
17. Overhaul Zoning Laws
Municipal governments refuse to allow the housing abundance Canada needs. It’s time for higher orders of government to step in and do something about it.
In most Canadian cities, overly restrictive zoning laws make it illegal to build the housing we need where we need it. Though it might look like our cities are experiencing a building boom, the truth is that most residential land is protected from even marginal increases in density. Even where it’s legal to build, developers can face intense opposition from neighbours, resulting in years of consultations, costs and delays.
It’s no wonder that housing prices have soared and many young people now expect to never own a home. How did this happen? In part, it’s because municipal politicians play it safe. Local elections have low turnout and low engagement, and they usually privilege incumbents. So when someone proposes an apartment building on a quiet street and residents say no, councillors tend to back them up—it isn’t worth upsetting their loyal constituents.
There are two ways to solve this problem, though both are difficult. The first is to replace our mayors and city councillors, make housing policy an election issue and hope we win. The second is for provincial governments to override local zoning with rules that are permissive, firm and easy to understand.
This is happening in fits and starts. In 2022, the Ontario government commissioned a Housing Affordability Task Force, which produced 55 recommendations. One was to allow at least four units on any residential lot, regardless of municipal rules. But the government itself vetoed the changes—so, for now, the plan is on the shelf.
B.C. had more success in 2023, upzoning large portions of its cities against the wishes of local governments. Now it’s building three times faster than Ontario. Any city or province could put in place similar recommendations tomorrow—all it will take is the courage to get it done.
—Dean Tester, co-founder of Make Housing Affordable
CASE STUDY
18. Ramp Up Rentals
Multi-unit housing in Canada has been all about condos for years. What we need now is more and better rental homes.
Millions of Canadians are renters, but in recent decades, developers mostly stopped building for them, especially in large cities. In the past decade, only 20 per cent of new apartments in Toronto were purpose-built rentals. As a result, most renters have to rely on investor-owned condos—but now condo pre-sales are collapsing due to rising prices and interest rates. Construction has slowed, vacancy rates have plunged and rents are soaring.
Adrian Rocca is banking on a rental renaissance. He’s the founder and CEO of Fitzrovia, a builder that specializes exclusively in purpose-built rental apartments. It has nearly 9,000 units completed or under development in Toronto and Montreal. Rocca founded his company in 2017 to tap an underserved market: renters stuck with aging, purpose-built rentals or underwhelming investor-owned condos. That contrasted sharply with what he saw in western Europe, where rentals were abundant and often built to luxurious standards. “Renters there never feel like they’re second-class,” he says.
Fitzrovia’s properties are similarly stuffed with high-end amenities: yoga sanctuaries, cooking classes, bowling alleys and more. On-site staff are available 24/7. Two developments even include a private preschool, called Bloomsbury Academy, where tuition runs to about $1,650 monthly.
None of this comes cheap. Rents for some three-bedrooms run north of $5,000. But Rocca’s main goal is not to build affordable housing. Instead, it’s to change perceptions of rental housing and to create greater rental supply. He believes that approach will ultimately lead to more construction—at all price points—and greater abundance.
There’s reason to think he’s right. A focus on rentals can help builders weather storms in the housing market, keeping shovels in the ground during downturns. Because Fitzrovia doesn’t depend on pre-sales, it’s pushed forward with projects even as condo developers have postponed or cancelled theirs.
Purpose-built rentals also tend to be designed with tenants, rather than investors, in mind. In Fitzrovia’s case, that means more three-bedroom units than most similar condo buildings. This is of particular importance in a city like Toronto, where family-sized housing units are in especially short supply.
Fitzrovia’s approach is prescient. In the first half of last year, rentals made up nearly half of all new apartment starts in Canada’s six largest metro areas. In some cities—particularly those with low development fees, such as Montreal, Halifax and Edmonton—rentals are now a majority of apartment construction.
The country’s largest city remains an outlier: rental starts in Toronto dropped last year, compared to 2023. If the trend holds, Fitzrovia will find itself in a more crowded space. “I’ll be happy to have the competition,” Rocca says.
CASE STUDY
19. Build Big on Indigenous Land
First Nations are becoming some of Canada’s most visionary, high-density developers
For decades, the Musqueam, Squamish and Tsleil-Waututh First Nations have claimed overlapping unceded territories throughout Vancouver. This created a problem: when the federal government disposes of public land, it owes a duty to consult with First Nations who may have a claim to it. In Vancouver, the three nations were sometimes forced to compete.
That is, until 2014, when they joined forces to create MST Development Corporation. MST is now responsible for some of Canada’s most exciting housing projects. The partnership holds six properties, some co-owned with Canada Lands Company, the Crown corporation that deals with surplus land. They include the Jericho Lands, a 90-acre former military site where MST will build 13,000 housing units; and the Heather Lands, a 21-acre site that will feature 2,600 homes.
Indigenous-led developments are a win-win for First Nations and housing-starved cities, creating developments of exceptional density and design flexibility. In 2022, the city of Vancouver rezoned the Heather Lands in collaboration with MST to reflect First Nations’ cultural priorities and economic ambitions. The multi-tower project will soar above the surrounding low-rise neighbourhood. MST has also created a cultural plan to guide all facets of the development, including landscaping, public art and architecture. Many units will be offered to homebuyers at below-market rates, with the province partially financing some purchases.
The approach is spreading. Canada Lands has partnered with seven Treaty One nations in Winnipeg, who acquired a portion of surplus military land in 2019. Now called Naawi-Oodena, it may eventually include nearly 4,000 homes. In Halifax, Canada Lands has partnered with Millbrook First Nation and will redevelop Shannon Park, another military base, with more than 3,000 homes.
Elsewhere, First Nations are developing reserve land—which allows even more flexibility. Because it’s essentially sovereign territory, developments are free of municipal zoning altogether. In Calgary, the Tsuut’ina Nation, in partnership with real estate firm Canderel, is building a master-planned community on its reserve near the city’s southwest edge, with 6,500 units. Back in Vancouver, on its inner-city reserve, the Squamish Nation is building Sen̓áḵw, an 11-tower development with more than 6,000 units—a scale far greater than would be permitted on municipal land.
Overall, tens of thousands of housing units on Indigenous-owned land are in the pipeline across Canada. “It wasn’t long ago that we could never have dreamed of the position we’re in today,” says Curtis Thomas, a councillor with the Tsleil-Waututh Nation. “We’re able to set a new precedent for how we build, and rebuild, this city.”
big idea
20. Print New Neighbourhoods
Developers are using 3D-printing technology as an efficient, climate-friendly building solution
Traditionally, 3D printers work best at a small scale. They extrude materials, like plastic or carbon fibre, layer by layer to complete an object—maybe a trinket, or a custom phone case. But the same technology, scaled up, could revolutionize homebuilding.
I became aware of the possibilities in 2023, when I was approached by the head of R&D at Printerra, a Toronto-based company that specializes in an innovative field: construction-scale 3D printing. Concrete is incredibly carbon-intensive to produce, and Printerra wanted to collaborate on developing low-carbon concrete mixes that could be printed using their technology.
I was fascinated. Picture a massive gantry system with a nozzle attached to a rail. Instead of plastic, it extrudes a concrete mix to build the walls of a house. You simply pour the raw materials—cement, water, aggregates and other additives—into the machine, and it takes care of the rest. The process eliminates the need for wooden or metal forms used to build concrete walls. The result is less labour, less waste and faster construction. A project that may normally take 200 days can be finished in 130.
Now, 3D-printed buildings are appearing worldwide. In March of 2024, a pair of architects began work on a 30-metre concrete tower in the Swiss Alps—when finished, it’ll be the tallest 3D-printed structure in the world. Last summer, a firm in Texas used a 45-foot-wide printer to construct 100 houses. And a Canadian company, Nidus3D, recently built North America’s first 3D-printed three-storey house in Kingston, Ontario.
The possibilities are incredible. Imagine using tailings—leftover crushed rock and trace elements from mining operations—in concrete to create sustainable, 3D-printed housing in remote communities. The tech is also adaptable. Concrete mixes can be quickly customized to local climates; researchers like me are developing region-specific mixes to withstand our country’s extreme temperature swings. Public acceptance is an issue: people need to feel confident in the safety and quality of 3D-printed homes. But the more buildings we see, the more that will come.
—Liam Butler, associate professor, Lassonde School of Engineering, York University
case study
21. Turn Empty Offices Into Apartments
Calgary’s downtown was devastated by an oil-price crash, then a pandemic. Now it’s turning six million square feet of empty office space into new homes.
In 2021, the downtown office-vacancy rate in Calgary hit an all-time high of 34 per cent. Seven years after the oil-price crash that cost the city thousands of jobs, and one year into the downtown-hollower that was the pandemic, the urban core still felt empty. So the city launched an ambitious project: converting six million square feet of it into housing.
Turning offices into homes is complicated. Layouts, plumbing systems and other building features have to be overhauled, and the financial risk is high compared to a conventional residential project. In order to entice developers, the city created a financial incentive program, subsidizing developers at $75 per square foot to get projects off the ground.
The first conversion began in 2021, turning a mid-rise 1970s office building into an apartment building, with two- and three-bedroom units. More projects quickly followed, and the office-conversion program blew through its $153-million budget in three years, instead of the expected 10. The city added more funding last year to keep it going.
There are now 11 office buildings in the city’s pipeline, ranging between 66,000 and 400,000 square feet. One is being repurposed into a hotel, and the others will be residential buildings. So far, 1,400 new units have been approved. The first few builds created a construction blueprint, sparked a more nimble regulatory environment and rekindled relationships between the city and developers, which city staff hope will cut development timelines on future projects. The conversions are eliciting interest from younger residents, eager for proximity to transit and workplaces. Seniors and families will likely become interested as more large, multi-bedroom units become available.
Calgary’s downtown office-vacancy rate is still stubbornly high, at more than 23 per cent—but the number of full-time downtown dwellers is higher than ever.
big idea
22. Construct Homes on an Assembly Line
Prefab housing will transform archaic building techniques—and produce safer, better, cheaper buildings
Imagine if we built cars like we build houses. You’d pick a model, pay for it and receive a pile of parts. Then you’d hire someone to put it together, outdoors, with no guarantee of quality, over a year or two. It sounds ridiculous, but that’s how we construct our homes.
I spent years in the development industry, first in my native U.K., then in France and then in Canada. After working on countless projects using the traditional approach, I saw the need for smarter construction. I found it in modernized methods and prefab building, which uses automated systems to produce components with factory-like precision in a controlled environment, with less labour and less waste. The result is higher-quality builds, safer working conditions and a more reliable supply chain.
Six years ago I joined the Ecohome Network, a Vancouver organization committed to sustainable building. Right now we’re preparing a pilot project to construct affordable prefab laneway homes. This type of housing has great potential nationwide, but historically it’s been cost-prohibitive. In Vancouver, a 750-square-foot laneway house can cost more than $400,000 to build. That’s where our prefab pilot comes in, using more efficient construction methods and materials to cut costs dramatically and make them financially attainable. Ecohome’s pilot project will offer laneway homes priced between $150,000 and $200,000.
The construction industry needs a radical shakeup. Many established contractors and developers prefer sticking to outdated methods because it’s easier and already profitable. But that’s changing. Major construction companies are getting interested in the obvious advantages of prefabs. You may soon even be able to choose a house from a catalogue—this year, the federal government plans to launch pre-approved prefab designs that builders and buyers can choose from to speed up housing delivery.
—Robert Pierson, CEO, Ecohome Network
Q&A
23. Grow Small Towns With Cheap Land
In northern Ontario, the small town of Cochrane is offering new residents parcels of land for $10
Way up in Cochrane, Ontario, a 5,000-person town 700 kilometres north of Toronto, one purple banknote could soon net Canadians their very own chunk of land. In October of 2023, the rural municipality caused a stir when it announced plans to offload roughly 1,500 serviced and unserviced residential lots for the low, low price of $10 each, quickly accumulating a 4,000-person list of interested parties (and developers) from across the country and around the world. Here, Cochrane’s mayor, Peter Politis, discusses the plan (not gimmick) to double its population—and sell Gen Z on the great outdoors.
To most Canadians, $10 raises the question: what’s the catch?
The figure was meant to create an incentive and generate discussion; it’s marketing 101. We needed to convince people—especially in the natural-resource workforce—to uproot their families. Nickel and lithium are all around Cochrane, and a lot of miners work weeklong rotations then go home. But a new base metal mine is scheduled to go up in 2026, and workers will have to move here permanently. We need housing now.
How do you plan to divvy up the plots?
A few years ago, we expanded Cochrane’s settlement area and built a 400-lot subdivision. We now have upwards of 1,000 serviced and unserviced lots. The serviced lots, for individuals and families, are going to be available to people who have the financial wherewithal to build a home within roughly two years. Developers can pitch us plans for the unserviced lots—the price is $10 for them, too.
Are you anxious about starting a big-city bidding war?
A bidding war between developers is exactly what we want, but we’re only going to pick ones that have an interest in investing in the community. We can’t just focus on $600,000 homes for miners who are making $150,000 a year. We have to look at the whole continuum—senior communities, low-income housing, tiny homes, et cetera.
Miners aside, who is the target demo?
Gen Z folks who live within the 100-kilometre band along the U.S. border. In Vancouver, Toronto and Montreal, most young people will never own a home. That quintessential Canadian dream is out of reach. We’re saying, “You can own here, and we’re going to provide you with a financial leg up and give you one of the best backyards on the planet.” So far, that messaging has been very successful. We have a list of more than 4,000 interested names from across Canada.
Do you think this might kick off a bigger migration to the north?
I think it’s been an eye-opener for other small-town mayors—we all talk. I always think about the congestion issues in the southern parts of the country. Why aren’t we making better use of all our space? Northern Ontario is almost 90 per cent of the province’s land but houses just six per cent of its population. Cochrane isn’t the Wild West, but we’re still building up this part of the country, which is cool. I’m telling you: folks, get out of the south. What are you waiting for?
QUICK HIT
24. Recruit more construction workers
A rapid immigration influx may bear some of the blame for our housing shortage—but it can also be part of the fix. Canada has a skilled-trades stream for new immigrants and yet, in recent years, they comprise just a fraction of a fraction of newcomers. In 2023, only 115 of 460,000 permanent residents came via the program. The feds have recently begun to target more tradespeople, and they could go much further. Provinces could use their own immigrant nominee streams to prioritize tradespeople, and they can make it easier for newcomers to use their existing training. Already, Ontario and Alberta have agreed on a new framework to recognize foreign skilled-trades credentials.
case study
25. Bring on the Robo-Builders
AI-enabled robots are becoming a fast, cheap and efficient fix for Canada’s construction-labour shortage
From digging a foundation to welcoming buyers, it takes nearly 11 months to build one detached house in a major Canadian city. That’s the result of rising materials costs, supply-chain difficulties and labour shortages. But another culprit has plagued the construction business for decades: a resistance to innovation.
Ramtin Attar is the CEO of Promise Robotics in Edmonton, and previously worked at software company Autodesk, where he founded an AI and robotics lab. “Most homes are built by tradespeople and small businesses who are just doing things the way they always have,” he says. In 2021, Attar teamed up with homebuilder Reza Nasseri to found Promise. They purchased off-the-shelf industrial robots—like those found in auto plants—and programmed them with a custom AI model that helps them perform building tasks normally done by humans: notching, stapling, cutting, nailing and making holes for plumbing and wiring. The robots don’t do repetitive tasks as they would on an assembly line. Rather, their AI systems interpret blueprints and decide in advance the most efficient way to tackle the work.
Promise’s setup doesn’t require a permanent factory. Instead, it uses a microfactory. The robots and other equipment can be moved to a convenient location near a construction site, where they put together building components. Once completed, those components—walls, flooring systems and so on—are shipped to the work site, where they can be assembled quickly. The basic framing of a house usually takes a month. Promise’s robots can finish it in two days. Total building time can be cut by roughly half, saving up to $400 a day.
Promise isn’t the only company employing robo-builders: there are now robots that weld, lay bricks, install drywall and even excavate foundations. And while it’s true that they’re doing work that would otherwise be done by humans, with Canada facing tens of thousands of unfilled construction jobs, that’s the least of the industry’s concerns.
