For generations, middle-class Canadians have been sold on the promise of homeownership. The promise was always flawed. Today it’s simply broken. https://macleans.ca/longforms/the-end-of-homeownership/
By Michelle Cyca [Excerpt – full article at link above]
I was born in Vancouver in 1987, and I’ve lived here nearly all my life. Anyone of my generation who grew up in this city spent their youth hearing constantly about the twin dangers that imperiled our future: a city-annihilating earthquake, and the always-rising cost of housing. Either might one day make living here impossible. Both felt vast and inevitable, forces beyond our control. So we carried on in the face of disaster, doing our best to ignore it.
Cities large and small, from Victoria to Toronto to Windsor to Moncton, are now grappling with the same intractable problems. There is far too little affordable housing and far too many investors bidding houses up and out of reach, creating a rapidly widening divide between Canada’s housing haves and have-nots. Those fortunate enough to already own property have watched their net worth soar along with the value of their homes, even as millions of others have been shut out. In 1986, a young adult working full time could expect to save for a down payment in five years. Now, they’d have to save for 17 years—nearly 30 years in Vancouver or Toronto
