By Harrison Faulkner May 19, 2022
A new poll is showing that 63% of Canadians who don’t yet own a home are no longer pursuing the dream of buying one.
According to the survey by Ipsos, six in 10 (63%) non-homeowners have “given up” on owning a home. The sentiment was highest in British Columbia (74%), Quebec (72%) and Ontario (62%).
The poll also found that more than two-thirds of Canadians (67%) said they believed owning a home is “only for the rich,” while 77% of respondents agreed that buying a home is “the best investment a person can make.”
Some Canadians appear to be open to co-owning a home. Ipsos found that 74% of Gen Z respondents would consider co-owning a home with a family member or friends, whereas 58% of Millennials and 43% Gen X Canadians responded the same way.
The Ipsos poll surveyed more than 1,000 Canadians between Apr. 14 and 19.
The issue of homeownership has been discussed thoroughly during the Conservative Leadership race. Many candidates have released their plans to address the increasing cost of buying a home in Canada.
Carleton MP and leadership candidate Pierre Poilievre announced that if elected Prime Minister, he would make federal infrastructure funding for municipalities contingent on building homes for Canadians.
Poilievre said he would target “severely unaffordable” big cities with a population of over 500,000 – including Toronto and Vancouver – by requiring them to increase their homebuilding by 15% annually.
Ontario MP and leadership candidate Scott Aitchison also released a plan to alleviate Canada’s housing crisis. The plan is called YIMBY: A Plan to Build More Homes for Canadians, which lays out the path to “(s)olve Canada’s housing crisis that will increase housing supply across the country.”
YIMBY – an acronym for “yes, in my backyard” – is an established term for a pro-housing movement contrary to NIMBYism (“not in my backyard”).
Aitchison’s plan sets out four objectives: ending exclusionary zoning in Canada’s big cities, expanding skilled trades, investing in public housing programs and cracking down on money laundering.