Finance committee  That's a very broad definition of it. I think it's is very important to recognize that financialization of housing has been around for a long time. Earlier in my opening remarks—

Finance committee  I was agreeing with your definition. If you buy housing as an investment as opposed to using it for shelter, that could be an example of financialization of housing. There are many definitions, and different people use different definitions. That's one I like to work with. There's probably some merit in coming up with some standardized definition that we all agree with.

Finance committee  I think what we're looking for from the private sector is more investment dollars making their way into the construction of more units. It's very important to also point out that people will blame financialization for the lack of affordability, but really, I think the lack of supply is the main issue that's creating the affordability crisis.

Finance committee  It's a provincial-level jurisdiction to set rent controls in Canada.

Finance committee  In Ontario, I gave the example for Toronto, where the rent increase was 29% for units that change hands. That would be rent control that is set by the Province of Ontario. The current approach in Ontario is to set a guideline for units that people remain in, but rent can change and move up to what the market can bear when a unit changes hands during the year.

Finance committee  I believe so, yes. It's their jurisdiction.

Finance committee  Yes.

Finance committee  I am not aware of any studies that we have that quantify those measures right now. I don't think I have anything I can provide. I can check when I get back to see if anything has been done. The only thing I can maybe point to is a recent survey done by Statistics Canada that outlined some of the key local-level impediments to supply.

Finance committee  The 3.5 million is an enormous undertaking. It's not something that CMHC or the federal government can do alone. Basically, an all-hands-on-deck effort has to happen with the private sector and different levels of government. I think it's a very ambitious goal. It's going to be difficult to attain.

Finance committee  I think you're quite right to point that out. Affordability has been deteriorating for much longer than just since 2018. I would say that as a result of a lot of our work, a lot of the discussion around policy to solve housing has shifted from demand-based initiatives before then to more of a focus on supply.

Finance committee  Absolutely, it's been a challenging environment in recent years, for all the reasons you mentioned.

Finance committee  Thank you very much for that question, and it's a fair one. I'm lucky I have my colleague Aled here, since he led a lot of this work. In 2018 we published a fairly extensive study on house price escalation. To my knowledge, that is probably one of the first pieces of work that really identified supply, or the lack of supply, as a key determinant of the escalation in house prices.

Finance committee  I think it's fair to say that we're moving in the wrong direction in terms of affordability. Affordability has gotten worse. We think supply is the solution. Unfortunately, supply takes time. For example, in the Toronto area, if you want to build a multi-residential rental building, it can take eight years from the time you have the idea that you want to do that until people are moving in.

Finance committee  That's an excellent question, and I don't have an answer to it. Mr. Woodcock, is that a question you can answer?

Finance committee  Thanks very much for that question. This being very new, we haven't had much of an opportunity to produce any estimates on the impact. We don't have anything. All I have is anecdotal evidence that a lot of builders seem to be suggesting that this can move many projects from unprofitable to profitable.