The largest challenge facing affordability of housing is the gap between supply and demand. The Canadian Mortgage and Housing corporation found that the demand for housing is out pacing supply. The population of Canada is also ageing creating a reduction in available labor resources adding further pressure to the affordability of housing.
Canada has an inadequate number of dwellings for the current population that can be calculated based housing units per 1,000 residents to generate a per capita housing data point. When comparing the per capita ratio within Canada to the other G7 Nations, Canada has the lowest rating of all the nations. In part the rise in population is contributing factor to the low ratio of housing to people. To right size the deficit Canada would need to build an additional 1.8 million homes of which close to 650,000 dwellings would be required in Ontario alone.
To help ease the affordability of housing for Canadians, attention should be given to solving the supply vs demand responsiveness including all levels of government. A key obstacle to overcome is how to improve the supply of housing which transcends different levels of government prevue of need, regulation, and local will. Zhang et al (2014) found that there is a requirement for the intervention of government to drive policy changes that promote the increase in offsite construction through incentives, regulatory measures, and efficient government supervision systems.
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