NDP plan helps Cambridge families buy a home as home prices soar

CAMBRIDGE – The Ontario NDP’s housing plan will help first-time homebuyers in Cambridge with their down payment — help that’s badly needed in Cambridge as prices have skyrocketed and large real estate investors are scooping up homes, says Ontario NDP candidate for Cambridge Marjorie Knight.

The Homes in Ontario Program (HOP), part of the NDP’s comprehensive housing platform, gives first-time buyers in Ontario up to 10 per cent of the price of their new home as down payment support, in the form of a shared equity purchase plan.

“Cambridge is a wonderful place to live, work and raise your family, and people who work hard and want to be a part of this community should be able to afford a home here that fits their family,” said Knight. “Sadly, here in Cambridge, we’re seeing young people and families who are ready to buy their first home priced out of the market. People deserve better.”

Home prices in Cambridge have soared according to the MLS Home Price Index. The price for a home rose 34 per cent over just the past year, and whopping 109 per cent since 2016. Meanwhile, CORE Development Group announced in June that it will buy $1 billion in single-family homes and rent them out, targeting Cambridge and a handful of Other Ontario communities. The NDP’s housing plan would take action to stop that.

“Families are finding themselves in bidding wars with investors, fighting for scraps and losing,” said NDP Housing critic Jessica Bell (University—Rosedale). “For too long, Liberal and Conservative governments have built housing plans that benefit big developers and billionaire investors, and the rest of us have paid the price. With Andrea Horwath and the NDP, there’s hope — because our plan is focused on regular people, first.”

The NDP platform takes on greedy speculators, flippers and bad developers to cool the market with several tools. People who don’t live at their property or don’t pay taxes in Ontario would be subject to a new speculation and Vacancy Tax, and a Non-Resident Speculation Tax which would be raised to 20 per cent and rolled out province-wide. The NDP will also implement licensing for short-term rentals, preventing investors from buying up properties to use solely for vacation and party rentals.

Background

As part of the broader Homes You Can Afford: The Ontario NDP’s Plan for Housing, the Homes in Ontario Program (HOP) would provide first-time home buyers with household incomes under $200,000 access to home equity loans of up to 10 per cent to help with their down payment. Home owners would then have the flexibility to buy back the government’s share or repay the loan only if and when they move and sell their home.

To take on speculators and cool the market, the NDP will increase the Non-Resident Speculation Tax from 15 to 20 per cent, expand the tax to apply everywhere in Ontario, and introduce an annual speculation and vacancy tax on residential property, among other measures. The NDP will also reign in pre-construction condo flipping and regulate short-term rentals.

The NDP’s plan also helps 311,000 households province-wide pay the rent with direct financial support, builds 69,000 affordable homes and 30,000 homes with supports, and recommits Ontario to the goal of ending homelessness within 10 years.