Here's an interesting, though not shocking, chart from a recent Globe and Mail article talking about "Canada's dysfunctional housing market." What is noteworthy is that Toronto is dead last when it comes to the number of new 3+ bedroom homes built between 2016 and 2011.
Peterborough, for example, is a census metropolitan area with somewhere around 130,000 people. And yet, based on this data, it is building more family-sized homes than Toronto.
Why this is not surprising is that the vast majority of new homes now built in Toronto are high-density and built out of reinforced concrete. This means that they are relatively expensive on a per square foot basis.
In fact, you could argue that mid-rise housing -- the exact high-density type that is supposed to be most attractive to families -- is the most expensive to build. What this means is that if you're building a 3+ bedroom home in this way, it's not going to be affordable to most.
It also means that people are going to go shopping elsewhere: Ottawa, York, Simcoe, Durham, and so on. The expected market outcome is decentralization. But in my mind, this raises an important question: Is this what people really want?
This is a great debate. And many will argue that grade-related suburban housing is exactly what people want. What we are seeing is a result of raw consumer preference.
However, the costs are so skewed in favor of low-rise housing, that I think it's hard to say with absolute certainty the degree in which this is true. What if higher-density 3+ bedroom homes were the cheaper option? My bet is that we would see a lot more centralization.
The development charge rate for a 2+ bedroom apartment in the City of Toronto is currently $80,690 per unit (effective June 6, 2024). As development charges work, this is supposed to pay for the growth-related impacts of adding a 2+ bedroom apartment in the city.
However, the above chart suggests that there are also impacts to not building that 2 or 3 bedroom apartment in an already developed area next to existing infrastructure. It means the home goes somewhere else (further away) or doesn't get built at all.
Both of these outcomes also have costs.
