Just like the housing market, the part you actually want is missing.

The Canadian Real Estate Association (CREA) is one of Canada’s largest single-industry associations. 

Our membership includes more than 155,000 real estate brokers, agents and salespeople working through 61 real estate boards and associations across Canada.

Narrowing the Gap Between What  Can be Built and What Can be Financed.

The mortgage and insurance system used in Canada today was designed and implemented almost 60 years ago. Our existing housing stock reflects what the regulatory and insurance framework has permitted lenders to finance for the past several decades, not what Canadians want, need, and can afford to live in today.

Since the turn of the century, Canada has treated housing as though only two typologies exist: the detached freehold house and the mid-to-high-rise condominium unit. Despite eight in 10 Canadians under the age of 44 saying they still want to become homeowners, this financing disconnect continues to limit missing middle housing at the exact moment the federal government is seeking to expand attainable and affordable options. As a result, the path to homeownership is narrowing for middle-class Canadians, including young professionals, growing families and downsizers.

While many jurisdictions across Canada are doing their part by reforming local planning and zoning laws to allow duplexes, triplexes, fourplexes and other forms of gentle density housing (in many cases, thanks to the federal government’s own Housing Accelerator Fund), these typologies remain difficult to finance. Canada’s insurance and underwriting rules have not kept pace. At the end of the day, allowing a typology is not the same thing as making it financeable or affordable to purchase.

REALTORS® see the consequences of this gap directly; in every community, and with every buyer who can’t find a property that suits their needs at a price they can afford. Solving the affordability crisis isn’t a task for the federal government alone, it requires a collaborative, all-parties-at-the-table approach. Alongside the broader need for systems change, though, there are outdated financing rules at play—and financing sits squarely within federal jurisdiction.

Addressing the disconnect between what can be built and what can be financed is how Canada can make missing middle housing not just permissible to build, but attainable to own.