Housing policy in the Greater Toronto and Hamilton Area cannot address the housing crisis if it continues to ignore homebuyers’ preferences. Land-use policy has prioritized increasing housing density without giving sufficient consideration to the kinds of homes Ontarians actually want to buy.

As surveys done by Ipsos and Environics have consistently shown, the majority of homebuyers in the GTHA and the rest of Ontario, including many first-time and immigrant households, aspire to own a single-detached home – not one of the condo apartments built in huge numbers over the past decade. Yet, land-use policies have increasingly mandated denser apartment developments in built-up areas rather than where a greater share of housing with ground-level access could be built.

The mismatch between what GTHA homebuyers want and what is available is important. It drives up the cost of single-detached homes and undermines affordability in urban areas. Move-up buyers remain in their existing homes rather than purchasing newly built housing, reducing the supply of resale homes. Households move farther from employment centres in search of affordability, while renters remain in rental accommodation longer, reducing turnover in the rental market. These trends exacerbate wealth inequality by making home ownership less attainable.

Frank Clayton is a senior research fellow at the Centre for Urban Research and Land Development at Toronto Metropolitan University. He is the author of a recent C.D. Howe Institute report on housing.