Thank you very much.
Good afternoon, honourable members.
I'm usually in Ottawa. I know that many of you are from Quebec, and I'm in Quebec City today.
Thanks a lot for having me today.
The Canadian Home Builders' Association, or CHBA, represents over 8,500 member firms across the country. Our members build low-rise, mid-rise and high-rise homes for both ownership and rent.
Housing starts are often presented as a single headline number, but the breakdown of that number is important to see the real story. While recent data shows that total housing starts have been above the historic averages, the composition of those starts has shifted dramatically. In a way, that puts long-term affordability, economic stability and home ownership further out of reach for Canadians.
Over the last several years, starts for housing intended for ownership have declined sharply as a share of total construction. In 2021, 69% of housing starts were intended for ownership. By 2025, that share had fallen to 49%, with purpose-built rental housing now accounting for the majority of new housing starts. That's a drop of 50,000 units for ownership per year. In fact, last week's spring economic update acknowledged that while housing starts totalled 260,000 units in 2025, they were driven by record levels of purpose-built rental construction supported by federal measures. Rental supply is needed, and CHBA strongly supports it, along with federal action that has helped projects pencil out in recent years. However, rental housing should not be replacing homes for ownership. We need both, and we need much more on the ownership side.
The federal government has set ambitious targets to double housing starts, yet CMHC numbers show that achieving affordability requires not just more homes but also more homes for ownership. CMHC has stated that 4.8 million homes are needed over the next decade to fill the housing gap. This would mean nearly doubling our starts to between 430,000 and 480,000 annually. However, CMHC also states that, to succeed, 75% of those starts need to be for ownership.
It should also be noted that the increase in housing starts for rental is not the result of consumer preference. CHBA polling with Abacus research shows that 88% of Canadians under 45 would like to own a home one day. It is the outcome of policies at all levels of government that has made achieving this goal increasingly difficult.
Builder sentiment, as measured by CHBA's housing market index, reflects this reality. In B.C., the single-family HMI is 5.8 out of 100. In Ontario, the multi-family HMI is at 3.8. Even Alberta, which has been strong, is seeing a drop in their HMI. Across the country, confidence among builders has deteriorated to record lows, indicating still fewer starts for ownership ahead—a trend that must be reversed.
High sales taxes and development taxes, restrictive mortgage policies, municipal red tape causing delays, excessive building code changes, and escalating material and labour costs have significantly driven up the cost of construction and reduced the viability of ownership housing projects. If buyers cannot buy, builders simply cannot build.
There has been much talk and a study from this committee about Build Canada Homes, which will focus on government-subsidized non-market housing. The development of more non-market homes is indeed important, but it is critical that, in parallel, there is a strong effort beyond BCH to address housing affordability in order to double starts in market-rate housing, where 95% of Canadians reside.
In order to increase housing starts and return to affordability, there needs to be a more comprehensive housing plan, especially for ownership. We saw some movement in the right direction with the spring economic update and recent federal announcements, such as $1.7 billion in funding going to provinces and territories through the improving housing supply act. This includes contributing to the removal of HST on qualifying new homes in Ontario. Other than the deal with Ontario—and even that has stalled due to lack of federal-provincial agreement on who will administer the rebate—