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These campaigns of nostalgia strike at the heart of one of the most ubiquitous frustrations among younger Canadians: that the housing market they鈥檙e facing isn鈥檛 the same as their parents, or their grandparents before them. They can鈥檛 get a starter home like a bungalow and make their way up听鈥� those homes, ripe for teardowns, can cost more than a million dollars in urban areas like Toronto.

Clawing into home ownership听has gotten harder, as rent eats up听a growing percentage of听incomes, leaving less to set aside. Soaring rents are also putting听heavy pressure on the lowest income Canadians, with housing insecurity rampant and homelessness on the rise in cities, suburbs and rural areas alike.

But turning back the clock on the housing market is no simple task.听In the lead-up to the vote, the Star took a closer look at the different levers the front-runners are pitching to pull听鈥� and what that could mean for you.

Which GST cut is right for you?

Prices for newly built homes skyrocketed during the pandemic and, despite record-low sales, still sit听around $1 million听on average for a GTA condo and听around $1.53 million for a single-family home听as of March. To combat the affordability challenges in the new-build sector and stimulate more听sales,听both parties are pledging to eliminate the five per cent federal goods and services tax (GST) from the purchase of select new homes, with slight differences for each party.

Carney’s听GST cut is limited to new homes under $1 million for only first-time buyers (saving up to $50,000), while lowering the听rate in some more expensive parts of the country for first-time buyers of homes that cost between $1 million and $1.5 million. Poilievre’s plan听would cut GST for all new homes priced under $1.3 million for any buyer (saving up to $65,000).听

While the GST cuts will help stimulate new home construction, the relief won’t be felt as keenly for the purchaser, said Steve Pomeroy, a professor at the Canadian Housing Evidence Collaborative at McMaster University. That’s because unlike tax added at the end of a restaurant bill, the GST on a new home is absorbed into the cost for every item used to build it, he said, making it hard to parse out what exactly the savings would be.

“The consumer isn鈥檛 seeing, all the sudden, the price go down,” he said, adding the GST cut would help enhance builder profits or offset the narrow profit margins.听

Experts told the Star that the tax cut also won’t make a significant impact in expensive markets such as in the GTA, as most new builds are condos priced at around $1 million, according to March听data from the Building Industry and Land Development Association.听The vast majority of homebuyers purchase resale properties, which are currently much less expensive.

This tax cut will help a small fraction of buyers, they said, potentially bringing back investors into the condo space.听

How many homes are we building?

Interest rates, material and labour costs, and now the U.S. trade war听have paralyzed the homebuilding industry. Typically, when the business cycle is down, a government role is called for to give the market a “nudge,” said Karen Chapple, director of the University of Toronto’s School of Cities, which is exactly what happened听after the听Second World War when government stepped in as the nation recovered economically.

Carney is vying to build 500,000 homes a year within a decade’s time, while Poilievre, who has criticized that figure as “out of thin air,” is promising听to build 2.3 million homes in the next five years (a rate of 460,000 a year).

To “catalyze” the housing industry, the Liberals propose $25 billion in debt financing and $1 billion in direct funding听to Canadian builders of prefabricated homes听that can be brought faster to market. For renters, the Liberals have borrowed one key pitch directly from the past听鈥� vowing to revive the Multiple Unit Rental Building cost allowance, a tax incentive launched in the 1970s that allowed rental housing investors to write off certain costs against nonrental income.

In contrast, the Conservative platform vows to听“end federal delays by cutting the bonuses, salaries and, if needed, firing the gatekeepers” at听the Canadian Housing and Mortgage Corp.听(CMHC) if they fail to approve housing applications in 60 days or less. It also promises to “simplify” the National Building Code to allow more flexibility in materials and building methods, and听create more harmony between provincial rules.听

To Chapple, “red tape” isn’t the biggest problem of today’s market.

“So many builders are听stuck. We have hundreds of thousands of units approved and in the pipeline,” adding that many builders don鈥檛 have the finances to get the projects to market.

Poilievre’s听platform also makes the assumption that it is a failure at the individual level, not the systemic level, she added. “It is not clear what basis there is for pointing the finger at lazy bureaucrats rather than the layers and layers of onerous regulations they have to navigate.”

As for the Liberal plan, the 1970s tax incentive听has been credited with assisting the construction of听about 195,000 rental units听in its era, paid for by giving up roughly $2.4 billion in tax revenue. A听2023 briefing note written by staff at CMHC,听first reported by the CBC and since obtained by the Star, warned that officials also received “many” reports of听abuse, such as investors buying units to use as tax shelters.

To Matti Siemiatycki, an expert in planning and infrastructure with the University of Toronto, the听tax incentive revival is still a logical move.

“In the rental world, the ‘70s is seen as this period where a lot got built and the country was actually able to keep pace with growth, so that kind of tax policy does seem sensible, because we need to crowd funding into rental housing,” he said. “There鈥檚 no way that government will be able to finance and fund all the rental housing that鈥檚 needed.”

Lower cost housing: build or barter?

A key divergence between the Liberals’ and Conservatives’ pitches is who should be responsible for homebuilding, with the Liberals proposing a new government agency while the Conservative platform largely hinges on getting “gatekeepers out of the way” and freeing up land.

The Liberals have proposed a new agency, Build Canada Homes, that听would take over all affordable housing programs from grants to low-cost loans, which听are currently under the purview of CMHC and act as a developer on public lands.听Through that agency, the party vowed $6 billion to bankroll听more deeply affordable housing projects, supportive housing, homes for Indigenous Peoples听and shelters. As well, the Liberals have pitched a tax incentive for property owners who sell to groups like non-profits and land trusts.听

In contrast, the Conservatives’ affordable housing pitch is to sell 15 per cent of federal land and buildings, work with cities to zone the properties for new development, and strike deals that bind new buyers to creating affordable homes on-site. In addition, the party says it will loosen the eligibility requirements to access affordable housing funding through CMHC.

While experts say using public land can be effective, Chapple cautioned those kinds of builds aren’t always simple. If looking to underused office buildings, conversions to housing aren’t听always possible听and come at high costs, she said; meanwhile, developing greenfield lands can require all new infrastructure and be located a fair distance from employment opportunities in urban centres.听

Still, David Amborski, a professor at 海角社区官网Metropolitan University鈥檚 School of Urban and Regional Planning, believes there are good examples of public land reuse to be found within the GTA, pointing specifically to听the Downsview Lands development听that is expected to create thousands of housing units in Toronto.

“There are many spaces like this in the GTA that makes sense to develop when the federal and provincial governments work together with the private and non-profit sectors to develop in all types of locations,” Amborski said.

On deeply affordable housing, the $6-billion funding allocation the Liberals have proposed was met with tepid reaction from听David Hulchanski, a University of 海角社区官网housing expert. That amount won’t go far enough to meet need, Hulchanski argued, especially if doled out over multiple years across the country. In 海角社区官网alone, 100,000-plus households are currently听.

Considering the pitches so far, Siemiatycki is especially enthused by those that fuel the non-profit housing sector.听Canada has a lesser percentage of nonmarket housing than other countries, he said, despite it offering long-term affordability.

“There is a huge sector in the non-profit space that鈥檚 mobilizing to take on the affordable housing challenge, and whether it’s land trusts or co-ops or non-profit developers 鈥� it鈥檚 the capital piece that will really give it wings.鈥澨�

Development charge cuts: for who?

A recent Star analysis showed that for a one-bedroom condo in Toronto, a builder would pay 238 per cent more in municipal fees in 2024 than they would in 2014, with those fees accounting for $81,000 of the total cost to build the unit. These fees include development charges, which are collected from builders to help pay for services and infrastructure such as roads and transit, water, sewer systems, community centres and fire stations.听

Both the Liberals and Conservatives have outlined plans to lower the amount builders owe to cities, though they disagree on听how to do so.听

The Conservative camp has promised that if cities cut these fees, the federal government will reimburse half the losses, with cities required to report back on how reimbursement dollars are spent. If cities increase their building fees instead, the Conservative party says it will withhold further federal money.听

The Liberals are similarly proposing municipal fee听cuts but more targeted ones, aimed at multi-unit homebuilders and limited to five years.听The party says it would work with provinces and territories to “make up the lost revenue” for cities.

Critics have noted that if municipal charges were reduced or cut, property taxes would have to cover the costs, impacting homebuyers and existing residents.

Siemiatycki believes parties are right to zero in on municipal fees that have gone up “faster than inflation,” but says strategies to avoid leaving already cash-strapped cities with larger budget holes听need to be robust.听

“The fees that cities are collecting, they鈥檙e using that revenue to pay for growth in various ways, so that money is really important,” Siemiatycki said, noting that contemporary cities have funding responsibilities that cities of the past weren’t yet facing. “Municipalities have had a lot of responsibilities downloaded on them without commensurate increases in their revenue sources.”

Siemiatycki also cautioned that the Liberal proposal to make up that revenue isn’t certain or simple, as it requires听provincial and territorial buy-in that听can drag out implementation timelines and result听in varied deals.

“You鈥檝e seen it with the health care deals, you鈥檝e seen it with the child care deals 鈥� it brings unpredictability, and more importantly, it takes time.”听

Spurring denser housing: sticks or carrots

Here’s where the two warring parties agree: we need more density to accommodate housing demand in the years to come. But to get that density, the听Conservatives are taking more of a “sticks” approach by vowing to withhold听funding from cities if they don’t align with federal goals, while the Liberals are adopting more of a “carrots” approach by dangling incentive money.听

The Conservatives, for example, have said cities would be required to pre-approve building permits for “high-density housing” around transit stations, and until that housing is finished, won’t receive federal money for transit lines.

The party has听taken a similar approach to overall housing output, saying cities will be penalized if they don’t boost homebuilding by 15 per cent each year, with bonuses also promised for cities that exceed targets.

The Liberals would double down on their Housing Accelerator Fund, an incentive program the Conservatives have promised to cut, that offers extra funding for cities that align with federal priorities. In Toronto, city hall secured听$471 million from this fund听by agreeing to, for example,听explore the idea of legalizing sixplexes听across the map.

Hulchanski, the U of T expert, says it’s not entirely clear what the Conservatives mean by preapproving permits. To him, any federally mandated rules around density 鈥� whether driven by incentives or the risk of a penalty 鈥� can be at odds with the reality of how decisions at the city planning听level are made, including the engagement process that is conducted with residents.听

“I don’t see how anything either of the parties, any of the parties are talking about, is going to change that process very much,” he said. “A big, national policy on these things is a long distance from those public meetings in the neighbourhood 鈥� and the vote of a city council.”