Once criticized for its slow start, the City of Toronto’s dedicated housing agency, CreateTO, has made major strides over the past two years. A new Housing Progress Update set to be presented at the agency’s next meeting on Monday highlights that three projects have begun construction since the summer of 2023, while six others have major development segment partners in place, including Ellis Don, Collecdev-Markee, Windmill Developments, Kilmer Group, Tricon Residential, KingSett Capital, and CentreCourt.
Notably, this latest edition of CreateTO’s progress update makes mention of the City’s new ‘Toronto Builds’ framework, approved by Council at their May session, which consolidates the eligibility criteria and requirements of Housing Now, ModernTO, the City-wide Real Estate Program (including the “parking-to-homes” initiative), the public developer model, and the tri-government investment in waterfront revitalization.
“These programs have included a wide variety of eligibility criteria and requirements, leading to inconsistency and a lack of clarity in direction when City land is mobilized for housing,” says the CreateTO report.
Meanwhile, the Toronto Builds report that went to Council in May lays out the new and improved policies, some of which are related to affordability (ie, 20% of affordable units in Toronto Builds Projects must be made available for rent-geared-to-income housing opportunities), rent control, (ie, all affordable rental homes must be rent-controlled per the Province’s rent increase guideline), and unit mix (ie, projects should deliver at least 10% three-bedrooms and 35% two-bedrooms, and a maximum of 45% one-bedrooms and 10% studios, to support the creation of family-sized units).
Although Toronto Builds is in its infancy, it’s set to be applied to almost 40 sites for the purpose of affordable rental housing, including 15 sites highlighted in the CreateTO progress report.
Also emphasized in the May report was the desire for the federal and provincial governments to create a Canada-Ontario-Toronto Builds (COT Builds) program, which would take a cue from BC Builds. Launched in February 2024, BC Builds is a program under BC Housing designed to speed up construction of rental housing available to middle‑income households. In addition to acting as a land bank and identifying property that is under-utilized and helping to make that land available for redevelopment, BC Builds also provides low-cost construction financing, and has a role in fast-tracking approvals if it becomes necessary. To date, the program has provided $77.1 million in grants.
BC Builds has already inspired a federal entity called Canada Builds, launched in April 2024, and in an interview with STOREYS from that month, former Housing Minister Sean Fraser went as far as to say that other provinces and territories should be following suit with their own versions of the BC Builds initiative.
Coming back to the City of Toronto report from May, it notes that the recent announcement of a landmark agreement between the City and the federal government to allocate $2.55 billion in low-cost financing for 4,831 new rental homes, including a minimum of 1,075 new affordable rental homes, “is an important step towards realizing the COT Builds program.”