Feds Pump More Dollars into Affordable Housing
Monday, June 27, 2016 @ 5:57 AM
Prince George, B.C.- Ottawa is investing an additional $150 million over the next two years to help British Columbians in need access affordable housing.
The funding is in addition to the $63 million joint annual funding provided by the governments of Canada and British Columbia under the Investment in Affordable Housing agreement.
The new federal government funding includes:
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$25.2 million to support the construction, repair and adaptation of affordable housing for seniors;
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$10.9 million to support the construction and renovation of shelters and transition houses for victims of family violence; and
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$50.9 million to help address the increasing demand for repairs as social housing units age and to improve efficiency and reduce energy and water use.
Just where the dollars will land has yet to be determined. “We will be working with communities throughout the province to identify specific housing needs and determine where the additional funding will be distributed” says BC’s Minister Responsible for Housing, Rich Coleman.
Comments
A sad joke when one considers this is for all of BC, and in light of what has taken place in Vancouver area real estate selling the housing stock off to foreign investors as a financial hedge for currency manipulation and off shore criminality from overseas ‘investor citizens’.
The whole thing is so bloody damn corrupt and this amounts to a small amount off appeasement to quiet the masses. What is really needed is a large income tax on foreign investments for housing, especially when it’s just used as a commodity and they can’t show how the investment money was earned legitimately. Then affordable housing might have a chance.
But Eagle, for every buyer there had to be a seller.
So you sell the shack in Vancouver for a million or two. And you take that money and move out of there. And the foreign buyer now has a property that’s going to be assessed, at a minimum, on the amount he paid for it. And that’s what he’s going to be paying Property Tax on, forever and ever.
The only rub is that this also raises assessments on other properties that HAVEN’T sold, and whose owners may never want to sell. So the solution seems quite simple. Base the property tax on what was originally paid for the property, and if there’s to be a feeling that’s not quite right when money continually loses its purchasing power year by year, then adjust the value of the assessment upwards each year by the official inflation rate since it was purchased.
If we’re going to have Property Tax, that’s really the only fair way to do it. After all, any tax collected in money should be on transactions, in money, that have taken place. Sales or income. Property Tax currently is a tax collected in money on an ASSESSED value, where no transaction has taken place, and might never, on the sale of THAT particular property.
I like your suggestion Socredible. Its one of the best ones I’ve heard yet. Makes perfect sense to only tax a home based on its purchase price plus the indexed cost of living inflation.
I had been thinking more along the lines of taxing the purchase of the property for a foreigner at something like 40% if the purchaser could not show an income stream from work or labor that accounts for the value of the purchase.
If they worked their whole lives and saved from their labor, than a foreign national could apply for an exemption if they were already permanent residents through the proper legal channels. But if they are just financial citizens that bought their citizenship through realestate purchases, and the money used is from financial trading and home flipping, or ‘casino’ ie organized crime proceeds… then tax them hard.
Its awfully strange that the lowest income areas of Vancouver also have the highest property values….
We can only hope that for ANY! money spent from Federal or for that matter Provincial money spent…. that any housing built is at minimum VISITABLE HOUSING or accessible. With our aging populations the benefit would be substantial and lend for more sustainability in long term planning
If you listen closely you can hear the sucking sound from the 604 money vacuum and the smiling/laughing crusty election machine .
There are a lot of politicians and their friends with property and property investments in Vancouver. When they start selling out then you will know if there will be a forced correction.
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