Blueprint for a Home Buyers' Bill of Rights

Introduction

Too many Canadians find themselves priced out of home buying in the communities where they work or want to live. There is a pressing need for more housing to meet diverse household needs across urban, rural, and northern communities.

Buying a home is often the largest purchase an individual or family will make, and is a huge milestone in their lifetime. Buying a home is a complex transaction often involving realtors, professionals like home inspectors or surveyors, lawyers, and multiple families. These transactions can become expensive and can take several months to finalize, with new issues and concerns appearing throughout the process.

Governments, real estate professionals, financial institutions, builders and developers, legal professionals and individuals all have a role to play in strengthening home buyers' rights. Collaboration is essential for  effective and fair home ownership markets - it requires that each actor respects the rights and responsibilities, and legal obligations of each party, and calls on everyone to act in good faith and with fair and ethical behaviour.

The National Housing Strategy Act (2019) commits the government to further the progressive realization of the right to adequate housing as recognized in the International Covenant on Economic, Social and Cultural Rights. While many key elements of the right to adequate housing apply to renting, many also apply to homeownership, to ensure that housing must:

• Come with available services and infrastructure, such as drinking water, sanitation, and energy;
• Be affordable, with costs that do not threaten the enjoyment of other human rights;
• Be habitable, offering adequate space free of threats to physical safety;
• Be accessible, addressing the specific needs of disadvantaged and marginalized groups;
• Be in a location that is not polluted or dangerous and where employment opportunities and public services are available; and
• Be culturally adequate, taking into account expression of cultural identity.

The Blueprint for a Home Buyers' Bill of Rights is part of the Government of Canada's commitment to improve housing access and affordability, as set out in Solving the Housing Crisis: Canada's Housing Plan. This Blueprint sets out a policy approach for fair and well-functioning home buying systems centred on four principles, which are:

1. Ensuring everyone has a safe and affordable place to call home;
2. Fostering fairness and transparency;
3. Addressing inequity and discrimination; and,
4. Safeguarding the system

Federal, provincial and territorial governments share a responsibility to fulfill the right to adequate housing. The current protections in place should be strengthened to support home buying and selling. This Blueprint for a Home Buyers' Bill of Rights is meant to express the Federal Government's policy objectives to do just that – by building a national consensus to ensure that the process of buying a home is fair, and transparent.

1. Ensuring everyone has a safe and affordable place to call home

The Government of Canada is making historic investments to build more homes, faster, because Canadians require safe, suitable and affordable homes located in livable communities, near employment and services.

The Government of Canada is improving the process of buying a home through changes to mortgage relief guidelines, the Tax-Free First Home Savings Account, and the Homebuilding Technology and Innovation Fund, to address supply through the scale-up, commercialization, and adoption of innovative housing technologies and materials.

The Government of Canada calls on provincial and territorial governments and all actors involved in home buying and selling to take measures to advance safe and affordable housing by:

• Adopting smarter, faster, affordable and sustainable approaches to increasing and improving home supply that delivers value for homeowners. This could include supporting streamlined permitting, or introducing incentives for gentle density;
• Ensuring building codes support more affordable, accessible, and energy efficient options that reduce both the operating costs associated with housing and greenhouse gas emissions;
• Implementing initiatives aimed at enabling a variety of housing types that meet diverse household needs, such as accessible and adaptation-ready design, multi-generational living, and options that allow people to remain in their communities as their household needs change; and,
• Adopting measures that increase or maintain housing stock used for homes, such as by implementing a speculation or vacancy tax; rules and regulations to address short term rentals; or measures that prevent fraud or misuse of real estate, such as a beneficial ownership registry (the beneficial owner is the one who makes decisions about a property, which may be different from the information on the deed).

2. Fostering fairness and transparency

Transparency and ethical practices are foundational elements of a healthy and well-functioning home ownership market. Transparency ensures that relevant and pertinent information is readily and easily accessible to everyone, empowering individuals to make informed decisions. Meanwhile, ethical practices cultivate an environment of trust, respect and fairness in the home buying system, promoting integrity and inclusive treatment. These elements are essential for establishing a sustainable and equitable environment that meets the needs of everyone involved.

The Government of Canada is taking measures to prioritize fairness and transparency in home buying by providing federal regulatory oversight of banks and insurers, and enhancing financial literacy and consumer awareness related to home buying, especially mortgages.

The Government of Canada calls on provincial and territorial governments and all actors involved in home buying and selling to take measures to advance fair and transparent housing by:

• Modernizing provisions and regulations to enable the comprehensive evaluation of factors to inform buying decisions, with adequate safeguards and opportunities for informed choices;
• Implementing initiatives to make pertinent home buying information readily accessible, such as access to title, safety and condition reports, accurate sale pricing and details on energy efficiency and climate resiliency (including flood risk and wildfire hazard) at the time of sale; and,
• Implementing measures to improve the home buying process and level the playing field, such as examining implementation of blind and open bidding approaches, enhancing price transparency through disclosure of recent home sales prices, mandating disclosure of dual agency (where the buyer and seller are represented by the same agent or agency), and providing comprehensive information on the benefits and drawbacks of each buying practice when options are available.

3. Addressing Inequity and discrimination

Some Canadians face particular challenges in home buying, and this is reflected in their rates of homeownership. First-time home buyers, especially younger Canadians, are disproportionately affected by high home real estate prices. Indigenous peoples face land ownership challenges and limited access to financing. Standard mortgages may present difficulties for newcomers and some cultural and religious groups.

The Government of Canada is actively taking steps to address inequity and discrimination in home buying by amending mortgage insurance rules to extend the amortization period for first-time home buyers purchasing new builds to promote intergenerational fairness, and exploring ways to remove regulatory barriers for homebuyers from diverse communities seeking access to alternative financing products, including halal mortgages.

The Government of Canada calls on provincial and territorial governments and all actors involved in home buying and selling to take measures to address inequality and discrimination by:

• Addressing barriers and closing homeownership gaps among equity-denied groups and Indigenous peoples through tailored home ownership programs or alternative financing and mortgage products. These may include: developing alternative mortgages; developing lending options or partnerships that increase access for Indigenous peoples; or, supporting hybrid tenure forms such as community land trusts;
• Making home buying information and services barrier-free and culturally appropriate for Indigenous peoples and other equity-denied groups by providing plain-language, online information on home buying; implementing home ownership counselling programs, including pre-purchase, purchase and/or mortgage intervention counselling programs; or homebuyer navigation programs; and,
• Enforcing strengthened measures to address discrimination in the housing system by updating legislation, rules and regulations, and by ensuring that complaint mechanisms are easy to access and navigate, while also advancing public education on rights and responsibilities and awareness of resolution mechanisms.

4. Safeguarding the system

A fair and well-functioning home ownership market provides homes for millions of Canadians. However, without proper regulation and enforcement measures, it can be prone to exploitation and unfair practices. These practices come under more scrutiny when there are tight housing markets and weak consumer protections. To ensure fairness and protect rights, it is essential that robust regulations are in place and effective enforcement mechanisms are ready to uphold them.

The Government of Canada is taking steps to safeguard home buying systems through the Canadian Mortgage Charter and by closing tax loopholes.

The Government of Canada calls on provincial and territorial governments and all actors involved in home buying and selling to take measures to safeguard home buying by:

• Strengthening oversight of professional standards and conduct of housing services providers and make clear their responsibilities and obligations through mandatory training;
• Creating and maintaining formal processes to hear, resolve and address complaints in a timely and accessible manner; and,
• Implementing meaningful deterrents and effective enforcement actions such as increased inspections; significant fines or penalties; or sanctions for non-compliance against bad-faith actors who repeatedly engage in misconduct.

Reporting

This Blueprint for a Home Buyers' Bill of Rights calls on jurisdictions across Canada to take measures to advance the rights of home buyers, and that responsibility includes reporting on how these rights are being progressively realized over time.

Recognizing the primary role they play in the home buying system, the Government of Canada calls on provinces and territories to publish an annual public report explaining how they are advancing the rights of home buyers in their jurisdictions as an element of broader efforts to fulfill the right to adequate housing for all.

Conclusion

This Blueprint for a Home Buyers' Bill of Rights supports fair and effective home buying systems in Canada. Realizing these principles will require proactive action from governments, organizations and individuals. This involves not only the implementation of new initiatives but also a commitment to ongoing improvement of Canada's home buying systems.