It will speed up the process of home building for developers
The federal government is planning to launch a catalogue of pre-approved home designs intended to speed up the process of home building for developers, a federal policy that was previously seen in the post-Second World War era.
Sean Fraser, the housing minister, announced that the federal government will be conducting a consultation process for the development of the catalogue in January.
According to Fraser, this will be bringing back a policy from the post-Second World War era when the Canada Mortgage and Housing Corporation (CMHC) developed blueprints that helped in speeding up the construction of homes.
“When many thousands of soldiers were returning home to be reunited with their families at once, Canada faced enormous housing crunches,” said Fraser in an article by CBC. “We intend to take these lessons from our history books and bring them into the 21st century.”
A boost for housing construction
The article further stated that many of the post-war home designs can still be seen in neighbourhoods across the country. The newer version of the catalogue will be focusing on low-rise builds like small multiplexes, student housing, and seniors’ residences. The catalogue will also explore a potential catalogue for higher-density construction.
The goal is to make sure that housing builds will be fast-tracked for the approval of the CMHC. It will also be promoting larger-scale production through factory-based construction.
The National Housing Accord, a report released earlier this year that was co-authored by Mike Moffatt, a housing expert and senior director of policy and innovation at the Smart Prosperity Institute, included the idea of a catalogue of pre-approved blueprints of houses as one of its recommendations.
Moffatt said that it has the potential to be transformative as it will help in speeding up the process of approval for financing up to municipal permitting. He also said that it has the potential to boost productivity.
“We made sure that we brought together builders and developers in the real-estate industry, along with academics, but also with the not-for-profit side,” said Moffat.
Fraser said that the catalogue will be in line with the national building code. The catalogue is set to come together sometime next year.
