Everyone is talking about housing these days. Provincial governments have loosened the regulations placed upon developers and builders, charging less for builds and providing land to these same businesses, all in an effort to alleviate the housing shortage everyone has known about for decades.
Let’s first point our fingers of shame at our political leaders, all seemingly in the pockets of Real Estate and Developers everywhere. Shame you overpaid, privileged, and often wealthy elected officials, shame! Well now, let’s see what the Premier of Ontario has done to assist you in buying a home. Doug Ford has not made any effort to change the market in any way, therefore the homes being built are for those who will buy them. Have the dough($) and you will be alright in a few years. The Ontario Conservatives are releasing land all over the province so builders and developers can buy them at good prices and develop homes for PROFIT. After all, we live in North America, the Capitalist Mecca of the world. So let’s say, if 250,000 homes are built in a few years, who will be buying them? Well of course those with the money, the investment, the well-off. Young people borrow funds from their parents, who provide funds they saved for their retirement. Now their babies want to live as their parents did, owning a home. The parents often will proceed into retirement deficiency in time. Over a hundred thousand seniors have no place to call their home, since they do not have the money to pay for housing. Anyways, Who else will buy these homes?
Foreign interests looking at these homes as investments
Canadians throughout the nation will move to Ontario to buy these homes.
Large Corporations specializing in mass purchasing of homes for rental or sales.
None of the homeless-houseless presently living in Ontario will get preference treatment, so the value of these marketplace homes will skyrocket.
Long ago I coined a phrase that went a little like this…”What is needed is a housing revolution”. I was referring to our attitudes toward the purchase of homes, and what a home means to us in North America. In the EU the great majority of people live in rented apartments. This continent has a generational attitude towards how, what, and where they wish to live. A roof over their heads seems to be all they want and expect to have. In North America the American – Canadian Dream is to own a 3,000 sq ft separated House with a backyard. Costly and wasteful too. Has not the period of giant homes passed us yet? Not so. So long as developers and builders( with their sales force of Real Estate Agencies) are allowed to build costly homes, they will. Developers, Builders, and Real Estate Hounds all work for the “Man”, Banking System with investments from the One Percenters who shape our economies daily.
What is affordable Housing? !st off apartments that rent for $750-1200.00 monthly. Town Homes that rent for 1200-1500.00 monthly. Yes, this can be done easily, so long as the investors that build these homes are willing to take the long haul as investors, accepting to acquire profit not immediately upon the sale of homes, but acquiring rent over many decades. Well, we know corporations want profit and they want it now, at least in North America. Not so in the rest of the world, where long-term investment has developed and prospered for a hundred years. Today, should a developer build a 1000-unit apartment building they will certainly sell each unit as a condo, not renting it.
Young people, there is nothing wrong with renting your 1st home or living in an apartment for a long period as well. Europeans, Asians do it all the time. If you are lucky enough to buy, you are enslaved by a thing called a mortgage that will drain you of saved wealth and limit your ability to enjoy your life. Rents are usually stable and predictable. A Revolution is needed led by the young to change how we not only perceive what a home is, but how it is to be built and by whom.
Lads and Ladies, Corporations do not give a hoot about you, your expectations, and your dreams. They care only about wealth acquisition. So who should be developing housing in Ontario and Canada? Your local and provincial governments. They are elected to protect, serve and guide you. Change the equation. Empower your City-Municipal and Legislative Councils to get into the Housing Development Biz. Don’t listen to the developers Real Estate Sectors Lobbyists and Media Partners, they will attempt to sell you lies and myths about owning your own home. Is not the place you lay your head at night your home?
What to do to achieve Empowerment?
1. VOTE objectively, and strategically for candidates that what real change and are not owned by Developers.
2. Investigate each elected official to see if they are indeed in the Developers pocket
3. Participate, communicate, and pressure elected officials to do what you want. DON’T BE LAZY!
4. Get involved in the government, it’s designing of housing. Have your say! Speak your mind!
Show your elected officials at every level of government what is needed. Quality housing at a reasonable cost.
Don’t pay for costly housing, demand and fight for your rights. HOUSING is a HUMAN RIGHT after all.
Steven Kaszab
Bradford, Ontario
[email protected]
