| M-66 — February 4, 2021 — — That the House recognize that: (a) housing unaffordability is a national crisis affecting every part of Canada; (b) 1.8 million Canadian households spend more than 30% of their income on rent, and 800,000 of those households spend more than 50%; (c) an estimated 2.4 million Canadian households experienced core housing need in 2020; (d) the definition of affordable housing is out of date and out of touch with the economic realities faced by millions of Canadian individuals and families; (e) Canadian real estate is being inflated due to the financialization and commodification of housing; (f) the inflation of the Canadian housing market is exacerbated by our market being used to launder money and as a tax haven for domestic and international investors; (g) corporations, numbered companies and real estate investment trusts (REITs) are investing billions of dollars into residential housing stock with the goal of extracting maximum profits; (h) REITs inflate the real estate market while benefiting from massive tax exemptions; (i) while some parts of Canada have rent controls and/or vacancy controls, there are no national standards to protect renters in Canada; and (j) some of Canada’s current policies for increasing housing stock amount to a transfer of tax dollars to private-for-profit entities, and do nothing to protect existing affordable housing stock; and that, in the opinion of the House, the government should: (i) recognize housing unaffordability and homelessness as twin national crises; (ii) re-define affordable housing using a better, updated formula; (iii) remove tax exemptions for REITs, unless they are being used to protect affordable housing units; (iv) do more to regulate foreign investment in residential real estate; (v) require restrictive covenants on affordable housing units built with taxpayer subsidies to ensure that those housing units remain affordable; (vi) create national standards to establish rent and vacancy controls; (vii) create an empty home tax for foreign and corporate residential property owners that leave buildings and units vacant; (viii) increase access to affordable properties for Canadians buying homes by regulating investors out of the market for residential real estate priced below median regional prices; and (ix) prioritize funding for non-profit and cooperative housing. |