Survey finds huge majority of British Columbians say homeownership now a luxury
A survey from Habitat for Humanity Canada shows 87 per cent of British Columbians view homeownership as a luxury.
The online survey conducted by Leger for the non-profit asked 1,500 Canadians a range of questions about the housing crisis. The survey showed more people in BC are willing to relocate than in any other province.
“Obviously not enough is being done and people are really feeling the impacts of a very difficult housing market,” Habitat for Humanity Canada CEO Pedro Barata told iNFOnews.ca. “The cost of living is hitting BCers really, really hard and people are making their views known in ways that frankly eclipses what we're hearing in other parts of the country.”
Of the BC residents asked, 36 per cent said they were willing to relocate within Canada and 25 per cent said they were willing to move to a new country.
“Where we're seeing the greatest pressure as a result of the lack of affordable housing is among younger Canadians, Gen Z and Millennials. And that's the generation that is most likely to say, ‘it's become so bad I can't afford to live where I want to live and so I'm seriously considering moving to another part of the country or even to another country,’” Barata said.
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The survey found 58 per cent of BC residents are spending more than half of their income on either their mortgage or their rent, and that is the highest number across the country.
“It means you have to take it away from other things like your food budget, other necessities, even your education,” Barata said. “Frankly that's not a calculation that this many Canadians should be having to make.”
On top of their willingness to relocate, 87 per cent of British Columbians viewed homeownership as a luxury, and 72 per cent agreed that homeownership was now impossible.
British Columbians also reported the highest rate of stress caused by housing costs, 42 per cent said their mortgage cost was affecting their mental health and wellbeing.
“Canadians understand that homeownership is at the heart of economic stability, well-being, and mental health. It's also at the heart of the intergenerational promise that we make to each other that each generation will be able to work hard, do the right things, and achieve equal or even better things than the generation before,” he said.
When it comes to intergenerational criticisms about the housing crisis, whether it’s young renters who think all homeowners have it easy or homeowners who think renters aren’t working hard enough, Barata said those narratives don’t reflect how most Canadians feel about each other.
“Anytime you find yourself in a position where you actually can't get what you want and where the gap between dream and reality just continues to grow, of course other narratives emerge that pit people against each other,” he said. “But at the end of the day, everybody actually has a shared vision and a shared value, which is that if you work hard and you do all the things you're supposed to do, it shouldn't be this difficult.”
He said that although a push for more purpose built rentals is good, more needs to be done to provide people with a path to homeownership.
“The fact that Canadians associate home ownership with their financial or mental health, and just seeing that more than half of Canadians are now paying more than half of their income towards their mortgage or rent, that's a really troubling statistic,” he said.
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