Federal government can boost housing affordability with more incentives, board of trade says

The Greater Vancouver Board of Trade has some suggestions for Ottawa on how to improve housing affordability in Metro Vancouver.

A new report calls on the federal government to create more incentives to build homes near rapid transit, changethe Income Tax Act to support new rental buildings, and lookat freeing up federal land for rental development.

It also suggests creating a tax credit or loan program for building new rental homes and for homeowners to build laneway houses or secondary suites on their property.

"While the federal government's National Housing Strategy makes meaningful strides, the board of trade believes the federal government can unlock more housing especially rental housing by using a broader set of tools within their toolkit," said vice-president Evi Mustel in a statement.

The report says people would need an annual income of just over $200,000 to both finance and cover the costs of owning an average home in the Metro Vancouver area.

It also estimates that in as little as six years, most of the people working the most in-demand jobs still won't be able to afford a single-family home in our region.