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If the federal Liberals have their way, younger generations of Canadians will have to be content with living in townhouses, condos and walk-up apartments. No single-family homes anymore where they can entertain friends on the deck while the kids run around in the backyard.
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And current homeowners will be subject to punitive taxes on the equity in their homes to pay for the Liberal dream of dense urban living.
You probably already know that Prime Minister Justin Trudeau was the guest of honour last month at a symposium put on by a lobby group, Generation Squeeze, that advocates for a “home equity surtax” that would cost anyone who owns a home worth $1 million or more at least $10,000 a year.
Trudeau and the lobby group, run by UBC professor Paul Kershaw, tried to keep the meeting secret. No reporters or members of the public were admitted. And both parties are still keeping the full transcript of Trudeau’s remarks hidden.
But what is less well known is that Housing Minister Sean Fraser and the Canada Mortgage and Housing Corporation (CMHC) are currently developing a “housing design catalogue” for builders and developers that would contain preapproved designs that municipalities could permit for immediate construction.
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The catalogue, in and of itself, is a good idea. The federal Liberals have committed to building 560,000 new housing units a year for the next seven years, up from the current annual average of 240,000. To come even close to that goal, it would be helpful to have ready-to-go blueprints that could bypass months of slow municipal approval processes.
The problem with the catalogue is that the federal government will consider no single-family dwellings for inclusion. The only designs being considered are for multi-family projects such as rowhouses, high-rise condominiums and two- to four-storey apartments.
Forget the dream of owning your own little patch of green on which to relax and raise a family. The unimaginative, woke, eco-obsessed federal government has decided for you that that is not your future.
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(There is also a federal initiative to get you to give up cars altogether in favour of transit and e-bikes. In Canada. In the winter. But that’s a subject for another day.)
The federal housing catalogue is not the be-all and end-all of designs. It’s intended more as a series of recommendations. So builders and buyers could still choose a bungalow or other private home.
What’s more outrageous is the idea of a 1% annual tax on homes valued at over $1 million.
Generation Squeeze’s founder, Prof. Kershaw, echoes so much of the Liberals’ messaging. For instance, he argues it is only fair to tax “wealth homeowners” a little to help middle-class home buyers afford more.
But there is also an edge of bitterness and resentment. A home equity tax, Kershaw says, is “about generational fairness.” Older homeowners should be taxed more because many of them have “gained from rising home prices while they sleep or watch TV.”
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What is being proposed by Generation Squeeze, and presumably by the Trudeau Liberals, is a tax of about $800 a month on the value of your principal residence, which up until now has always been tax exempt.
The really big problem with the tax is it would not tax wealthy homeowners as much as homeowners with the bad luck to live in the country’s most expensive housing markets. In Vancouver, over 70% of homes are worth in excess of $1 million, including tiny, old and disrepaired homes. In Toronto, over 60% of homes would be subject to the new tax.
No doubt many middle-class homeowners, seniors and young couples would be forced to sell their homes as a result of such an added burden.
The brains behind this tax claim it would only affect 10% of Canadians, but most of that 10% are not “rich.”
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GUNTER: Would a federal tax on your principal residence be next? - Toronto Sun
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