Beautiful Virgin Islands

Thursday, Sep 18, 2025

Canada prepares to ban foreigners from buying homes to cool property market

Canada prepares to ban foreigners from buying homes to cool property market

Canada is preparing to ban foreigners from buying homes for two years to stave off inflation, as the Trudeau government seeks to fend off political backlash to soaring inflation.

Canada will ban most foreigners from buying homes for two years and provide funding to boost supply to help stem soaring property prices. That is a warning shot for new investors from China and India, two of the biggest winners of permanent residency in recent years.

The measures will be contained in the state budget to be unveiled on Thursday, Bloomberg reported, citing a person familiar with the matter, asking not to be named because the matter is private. The ban, however, will not apply to students, foreign workers or permanent residents, the person said.

The move signals that Prime Minister Justin Trudeau is becoming more assertive about taming one of the world’s most expensive housing markets, and that the government is growing more concerned about the political backlash to inflation and the rising cost of housing.

“Lack of supply is the culprit. Construction of new housing units have slowed during the past two years due to the pandemic,” said Alisha Ma, founder and managing director of Halcyon Counsel, an immigration consultancy in Hong Kong. “Returning Canadians and emigration from Hong Kong” will compound the problem, she added.

Canada’s Prime Minister Justin Trudeau speaks in the House of Commons on April 6.


Home prices in Canada have soared more than 50 per cent over the past two years. The market saw a record monthly increase in February as buyers acted ahead of rate increases by the Bank of Canada, taking the benchmark price of a home to C$869,300 (US$692,407).

Still, foreign ownership of Canadian homes remains small at about 3.8 per cent in British Columbia, and 2.2 per cent in Ontario, according to official data. The proposed ban is unlikely to alter much of the bullish fundamental or kill the market, according to Dexter Realty in Vancouver.

“Most areas of British Columbia have a 20 per cent tax on foreign buyers already, which practically eliminates” them from the market, managing director Kevin Skipworth said by phone. “Likely not much to change here.”

Canada took in 341,180 permanent residents in 2019 in its open-door immigration policy, the most since 1913, according to government statistics, before the number plunged to 184,606 in 2020 because of the Covid-19 pandemic and cross-border travel restrictions.

Mainland Chinese accounted for 30,246 in 2019 and 16,535 in 2020 of them. Citizens from India took up 85,593 in 2019 and 42,876 in 2020. The government targets to issue between 431,000 and 451,000 annually from 2022 to 2024.

The Canadian government has committed to offering temporary residence for qualified Hongkongers in response to China’s imposition of a national security law in June 2020. This could affect a small pool of buyers from Hong Kong, said Keelan Chapman.

“In the last couple of years, I would say roughly around 70 per cent of our buyers are either Canadian passport holders or have plans of immigrating there,” said Chapman, Hong Kong-based director and founder of Canadian Real Estate Investment Centre. The number of Hongkongers emigrating to Canada has been increasing, he added.

Several billion dollars in Finance Minister Chrystia Freeland’s budget will be allocated to building affordable housing and to helping local governments update their systems to allow faster construction of new properties, according to Bloomberg.

During last year’s election campaign, Trudeau’s party also proposed a ban on “blind bidding” for houses, the prevailing system by which offers are kept secret when someone is auctioning a home.

The Canadian Real Estate Association, a body representing property agents, has shied away from defending the blind-bidding practice. It announced a pilot project on Wednesday to display offers in real time on properties listed on its listing website.

“Multiple-offer scenarios have become increasingly commonplace in today’s real estate environment,” Michael Bourque, the association’s chief executive officer, said in a statement. “Canadian property buyers and sellers seek greater confidence in the process.” The pilot will begin in select markets this summer, the association said.

Newsletter

Related Articles

Beautiful Virgin Islands
0:00
0:00
Close
US Tech Giants Pledge Billions to UK AI Infrastructure Following Starmer's Call
Saudi Arabia cracks down on music ‘lounges’ after conservative backlash
DeepMind and OpenAI Achieve Gold at ‘Coding Olympics’ in AI Milestone
SEC Allows Public Companies to Block Investors from Class-Action Lawsuits
Saudi Arabia Signs ‘Strategic Mutual Defence’ Pact with Pakistan, Marking First Arab State to Gain Indirect Access to Nuclear Strike Capabilities in the Region
Federal Reserve Cuts Rates by Quarter Point and Signals More to Come
Effective and Impressive Generation Z Protest: Images from the Riots in Nepal
European manufacturers against ban on polluting cars: "The industry may collapse"
Sam Altman sells the 'Wedding Estate' in Hawaii for 49 million dollars
Trump: Cancel quarterly company reports and settle for reporting once every six months
Turkish car manufacturer Togg Enters German Market with 5-Star Electric Sedan and SUV to Challenge European EV Brands
US Launches New Pilot Program to Accelerate eVTOL Air Taxi Deployment
Christian Brueckner Released from German Prison after Serving Unrelated Sentence
World’s Longest Direct Flight China Eastern to Launch 29-Hour Shanghai–Buenos Aires Direct Flight via Auckland in December
New OpenAI Study Finds Majority of ChatGPT Use Is Personal, Not Professional
Hong Kong Industry Group Calls for HK$20 Billion Support Fund to Ease Property Market Stress
Joe Biden’s Post-Presidency Speaking Fees Face Weak Demand amid Corporate Reluctance
Charlie Kirk's murder will break the left's hateful cancel tactics
Kash Patel erupts at ‘buffoon’ Sen. Adam Schiff over Russiagate: ‘You are the biggest fraud’
Homeland Security says Emmy speech ‘fanning the flames of hatred’ after Einbinder’s ‘F— ICE’ remark
Charlie Kirk’s Alleged Assassin Tyler Robinson Faces Death Penalty as Charges Formally Announced
Actor, director, environmentalist Robert Redford dies at 89
The conservative right spreads westward: a huge achievement for 'Alternative for Germany' in local elections
JD Vance Says There Is “No Unity” with Those Who Celebrate Charlie Kirk’s Killing, and he is right!
Trump sues the 'New York Times' for an astronomical sum of 15 billion dollars
Florida Hospital Welcomes Its Largest-Ever Baby: Annan, Nearly Fourteen Pounds at Birth
U.S. and Britain Poised to Finalize Over $10 Billion in High-Tech, Nuclear and Defense Deals During Trump State Visit
China Finds Nvidia Violated Antitrust Laws in Mellanox Deal, Deepens Trade Tensions with US
US Air Force Begins Modifications on Qatar-Donated Jet Amid Plans to Use It as Air Force One
Pope Leo Warns of Societal Crisis Over Mega-CEO Pay, Citing Tesla’s Proposed Trillion-Dollar Package
Poland Green-Lights NATO Deployment in Response to Major Russian Drone Incursion
Elon Musk Retakes Lead as World’s Richest After Brief Ellison Surge
U.S. and China Agree on Framework to Shift TikTok to American Ownership
London Daily Podcast: London Massive Pro Democracy Rally, Musk Support, UK Economic Data and Premier League Results Mark Eventful Weekend
This Week in AI: Meta’s Superintelligence Push, xAI’s Ten Billion-Dollar Raise, Genesis AI’s Robotics Ambitions, Microsoft Restructuring, Amazon’s Million-Robot Milestone, and Google’s AlphaGenome Update
Le Pen Tightens the Pressure on Macron as France Edges Toward Political Breakdown
Musk calls for new UK government at huge pro-democracy rally in London, but Britons have been brainwashed to obey instead of fighting for their human rights
Elon Musk responds to post calling for the murder of Erika Kirk, widow of Charlie Kirk: 'Either we fight back or they will kill us'
Czech Republic signs €1.34 billion contract for Leopard 2A8 main battle tanks with delivery from 2028
USA: Office Depot Employees Refused to Print Poster in Memory of Charlie Kirk – and Were Fired
Proposed U.S. Bill Would Allow Civil Suits Against Judges Who Release Repeat Violent Offenders
Penske Media Sues Google Over “AI Overviews,” Claiming It Uses Journalism Without Consent and Destroys Traffic
Indian Student Engineers Propose “Project REBIRTH” to Protect Aircraft from Crashes Using AI, Airbags and Smart Materials
French Debt Downgrade Piles Pressure on Macron’s New Prime Minister
US and UK Near Tech, Nuclear and Whisky Deals Ahead of Trump Trip
One in Three Europeans Now Uses TikTok, According to the Chinese Tech Giant
Could AI Nursing Robots Help Healthcare Staffing Shortages?
NATO Deploys ‘Eastern Sentry’ After Russian Drones Violate Polish Airspace
Anesthesiologist Left Operation Mid-Surgery to Have Sex with Nurse
Tens of Thousands of Young Chinese Get Up Every Morning and Go to Work Where They Do Nothing
×