World’s Second Largest Country Canada Running out Of Land

The world's second biggest country by landmass is effectively running out of space, and that has Canada on course for a reckoning. The dream of a detached home and a piece of land, which generations of Canadians have taken for granted, and which continues to entice ne

BY Realty Plus
Published - Thursday, 20 May, 2021

World’s Second Largest Country Canada Running out Of Land

The world's second biggest country by landmass is effectively running out of space, and that has Canada on course for a reckoning. The dream of a detached home and a piece of land, which generations of Canadians have taken for granted, and which continues to entice new immigrants, may soon be out of reach in the places where people want to live. That could force an expansion of the idea of home to include condos and rentals, potentially transforming how the middle class does everything from raising families to saving for retirement. City-specific factors have constrained land use even more. Vancouver is squeezed between the Pacific Ocean and the mountains; provincial regulations against urban sprawl have effectively turned Toronto and Ottawa into islands for the purposes of development; and Montreal actually is an island. "If we think of first-time home buyers, a young couple starting out, it's much more realistic for them to be considering a condo apartment as a starter home from an affordability standpoint," said Royal Bank of Canada's Hogue. "This is the norm for large global cities. I'm hard pressed to think of any major global city where a single-detached home near the core urban area is affordable." Canada is going to need more apartments too, especially as Prime Minister Justin Trudeau moves to boost immigration to historic records to make up for the pandemic lull. The country has a shortage of homes generally, posting the lowest number of housing units per 1,000 people among Group of Seven countries, according to a recent report from the Bank of Nova Scotia. That pressure means the slack that's appeared in urban condo and rental markets over the last year is expected to be short-lived, going a long way to explaining developers' focus on density. Rather than land constraints, the main obstacle to building more apartments in Canada's cities is local zoning regulations. But even if more apartments get built, Canadians will have to get used to living in them. Still, with home prices forecast to keep rising.