An actual figure is hard to estimate, but the Trudel finance team has calculated the taxes: school taxes, municipal taxes, the green space tax, development royalties and a foundational transit system tax, if that's the case. Now there's no more federal HST, which is a step in the right direction, but there's still a provincial QST. There are also—and this is no joke—an elevator tax and an elevator music tax. If you calculate all this, the total comes to $500 a month, an amount that won't apply for only one, two or three months, but rather for the entire lifespan of the property. Consequently, for every unit, that's a monthly amount of $500 that won't come back to us. In other words, the first $500 that people pay out won't be used to construct the building. What's more, construction costs have doubled in recent years.
In the Quebec City region, you need a miracle to build affordable housing units at $1,027 a month thanks to the MLI Select program of the Canada Mortgage and Housing Corporation, or CMHC. It's a good program. Access to a brand new, high-quality home located in an integrated living environment will change the lives of ordinary people, single people and vulnerable people.
However, we propose that CMHC enhance the program to enable us to build two or three-bedroom units for single-parent and reconstituted families. According to the federal criterion, a unit that rents for $1,027 is currently an affordable unit. However, at $1,027 a month, we have no choice but to build a small unit suitable for a single person. It's impossible to build a two or three-bedroom unit because the bank would never agree to finance the building. I've tried for years to explain to CMHC that the MLI Select program has to be enhanced to give single-parent and reconstituted families a chance. Everyone tells me I'm right, but nothing ever changes.