Housing affordability remains one of TRREB’s top advocacy priorities. At the federal level, financing is among the most effective tools for improving housing affordability. Over the past decade, targeted initiatives supporting rental housing, such as the Apartment Construction Loan Program, have demonstrated the impact of financial incentives. The concentration of purpose-built rental projects among 2025 housing starts shows the impact of the incentives.

However, governments must not lose sight of the fact that most Canadians, including younger generations, continue to aspire to homeownership. They deserve a range of housing options, including a realistic pathway to purchasing a home.

TRREB’s Position

In our submission to the federal consultation on financing measures to support housing supply for owners and renters, TRREB emphasized that federal financing programs must reflect how residents finance, build, and purchase homes today.

Federal housing policy should not force a choice between rental housing and homeownership. Canada needs both. Instead, the federal government should support a housing continuum that allows residents to rent when it best suits their needs, transition into homeownership when they are ready, move into larger homes as their families grow, and rightsize later in life.

Recommendations

TRREB recommends that the federal government take the following actions:

• Add a fourth eligibility category to CMHC’s MLI Select program to support multiplex missing-middle and ownership-oriented housing projects.
• Modernize the mortgage stress test to better reflect current market conditions and ensure it remains proportionate to actual financial risk.
• Reintroduce a modern Multi-Unit Residential Building (MURB) tax incentive for new purpose-built rental housing, including missing-middle rental projects, with incentives tied directly to new housing supply.
• Expand the Apartment Construction Loan Program to include smaller-scale, missing-middle housing developments.

Next Steps

Canada cannot consider its housing strategy a success if it significantly increases rental supply while the supply of attainable ownership housing continues to decline. At the same time, supporting homeownership must not come at the expense of rental construction.

TRREB will continue to advocate for a balanced and healthy housing system that supports movement across the entire housing continuum and gives Canadians a full range of housing choices.

For complete details, read TRREB’s submission to the federal government.