The Canada Mortgage and Housing Corporation (CMHC) says $40 billion isn’t enough to fulfill the federal government’s national housing strategy. The agency is now looking to raise an extra $100 million to put towards housing, The Canadian Press reports.
“As massive as those investments are by the government of Canada, and the investments similarly that provinces are making, they're not going to be enough,” CMHC’s chief executive, Evan Siddall, told CP in an interview.
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The extra $100 million will likely come from private sources and the money will be put towards making houses affordable for all Canadians, Siddall said.
This initiative from CMHC falls in line with their ambitious corporate plan to have all Canadians in affordable homes by 2030. Today, an estimated 1.6 million households in Canada are either too expensive or unsuitable for the people who live in them, which is why housing is such a high priority for the government.
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While Siddall admitted that raising extra millions of dollars is a longshot, he hopes the goal will push his agency to do as much as they can for the housing cause.
CMHC has been directly involved with the federal government’s national housing strategy since it was announced in 2017. In the next year, the corporation plans to put $2.4 billion towards loans and funding to repair 15,000 housing units and to create 8,300 new ones.
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Overall, the government’s housing strategy aims to get 530,000 Canadian families out of housing need by creating 100,000 new units and repairing more than 300,000 existing units in the next 10 years.
The strategy is currently in full swing. In Ontario, the federal and provincial governments announced they will invest $14.4 million into creating 127 affordable housing units in the northwest region.
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“Every Canadian, no matter their age, physical abilities, or background, deserves a safe and affordable place to call home. It’s investments like this that give Canada’s middle class and those working hard to join it a fair chance at success,” said Patty Hajdu, the Minister of Employment, Workforce, and Labour and Member of Parliament for Thunder Bay—Superior North.
The government also announced last month that it will invest $89 million into creating a 16-storey building in Etobicoke with 259 affordable one- and two-bedroom units.
