Reaction to Ontario’s Fair Housing Plan
Ontario recently announced its “Fair Housing Plan”. This plan is meant to help cool the housing market. It includes potential curbs on vacant properties and a foreign buyers’ tax. Industry organisations have been reacting to the new regulations.
Toronto Real Estate Board (TREB)
TREB issued a statement welcoming the plan and governments prioritizing the housing market.
The also issed the following warning: “TREB strongly believes that public policy decisions with regard to the housing market should be evidence-based and supported by empirical data. In this regard, it is not clear that the issues targeted by the policies announced today are fully understood at this point, nor is it clear how effective these policies will be, or if they will have unintended outcomes.”
Ontario Real Estate Association (OREA)
OREA CEO Tim Hudak offered the following comments: “For one, increasing the supply of homes is the best way to give buyers a better shot at home ownership and the government has committed to working with municipalities to remove the barriers to getting more new homes and listings on the market faster”.
Genworth ( Mortgage Insurer)
Stuart Levings, president and CEO of Genworth said: “As an insurer of first-time homebuyers, we have seen a growing divergence between what first-time buyers can afford and average market prices. These measures will help responsible families and individuals achieve their dreams of homeownership while protecting the equity that existing GGH homeowners have invested in their properties,”.