ICYMI, Cara and I talked about the outlook for Canadian housing in 2026 and beyond, examined a couple of CMHC reports and some polling data on Toronto's mayoral election, and took a number of viewer questions.
Watch here: www.youtube.com/watc...
Starting now! Live episode of "Answer Period", where we're talking about Canada's housing outlook for 2026, and taking your predictions and questions.
Join us here: www.youtube.com/watc...
I'm not great at catching this stuff the best of times, and I'm just getting over the flu. So it's going to be a bit of an error filled week.
CMHC's 2026 Housing Supply report is out. At noon ET today, Cara and I will be talking about it, other housing predictions, and how housing could impact elections (incl. Toronto's), and taking your predictions and questions.
Join us here:
New episode! Canada vs. Alabama GDP comparisons sparked outrage. But the real story is Canada’s declining living standards and a growing generational divide. We do a deep dive on the numbers and what they say about our standard of living.
Watch here: www.youtube.com/watc...
I had our producer make a new version, taking out my goofs.
Oh, on the thumbnail! I don't know how I missed that.
Date looks right. The EST/EDT thing is my goof.
Oof, that's not good RE: date. Let me check that.
Tomorrow at Noon EST, we'll be hosting a live Answer Period on YouTube. We'll be looking at 2026 housing predictions, and taking predictions and questions from the audience; click on the link to leave a prediction or question.
Link: www.youtube.com/watc...
On Friday, we recorded our first-ever "Answer Period" - a livestream podcast where we discuss issues and take viewer questions. Meredith and I talk about the housing crisis, what we're optimistic about, and potentially running for office.
Watch here: www.youtube.com/watc...
They own more than all adults under the age of 30, and that's a much larger cohort.
And that's even before considering the type of homes they own.
How is it not skewed to have homeownership rates highest among 85+ year olds?
Yes, there's fewer of them, but would anyone say that wealth distributions aren't skewed on the grounds of "there really aren't that many billionaires?"
So 71% of 85+ year old head-of-households own, and 29% rent, in the city of Toronto.
Housing was an investment in *1911*.
This idea that there was some golden age of housing, where it wasn't treated as an investment, simply is untrue. It's a claim made without a shred of evidence.
And you're opposed to changing that? Why?
Price-to-income ratios under 3x.
That's the wrong metric to use as:
1. Dwelling per capita ratios are falling with population aging
2. Home sizes are also falling with the move to 1-bedroom condos.
It's the percentage of heads of household who own (as opposed to rent).
Year-over-year demand from population aging has been on decline for at least two decades, probably three.
But there are other sources of population growth-based demand.
The images are directly from the federal catalogue, they don't come from us.
That's about a 9-iron shot from where I live. (Though the local residents frown on me using the neighbourhood as a golf course)
Politically unworkable. Every year governments make the tax/transfer system *more* beneficial to seniors', not less.
I hear this a lot as well.
Here's an ad from my current neighbourhood, from *1911*, talking about the "speculative potential" of residential properties.
Over the last 100+ years, housing has *always* been considered an investment. And it's also often been affordable.
The bubble burst in 1989-90.
Even 15 years later, in 2004, a middle-class family could afford a family-sized home in almost all of the country.
And in addition to younger people who did form households owning at lower rates than their peers across time and space, younger people are forming households (of any tenure) at lower rates. @lausterna.bsky.social and I decomposed this into a dual measure of housing frustration.
This was written in 1996:
"...houses will be what they were before the Boomers entered the housing market, places to live in rather than investments. Boomers who think they will be able to sell their houses in, say, 2010 and live in luxury thereafter on the proceeds will be in for a surprise"
