Federal rent control? There are smarter ways to make rental housing more affordable.

La version française de ce billet se trouve ici.

In March of this year, Avi Lewis became leader of Canada’s New Democratic Party after a decisive first-ballot victory. Central to his policy platform was a commitment to regulate rents across Canada.[1]

Avi is correct in assessing that the cost of housing is out of reach for many Canadians; but his proposal to impose rent control across Canada would face an uphill battle. There are far more practical ways to improve housing affordability for Canadians.

Here are 10 things to know:

1. Stricter rent regulation—known colloquially as ‘rent control’—is very popular with voters. Polling from 2023 finds that 65% of all Canadians support it, while just 14% of Canadians oppose it.

2. There is some precedent for federal rent control in Canada. We had it both during World War II and beginning in the mid 1970s in the face of very high inflation (Keating provides a useful overview here, while Nash and Skaburskis offer analysis here).

3. More rent regulation could have unintended consequences. A 2025 report by the Canada Mortgage and Housing Corporation finds that stricter rent regulation can result in less supply, less residential mobility, and reduced housing quality. This 2024 meta-analysis makes similar findings.

4. Having said that, not all research paints a bleak picture of rent control. Some research supports it (including this 2011 Canadian study by Grant). Indeed, many economists recognize the value of mild, newer forms of rent controls (see this book chapter by Skaburskis and Teitz, for example). This wasn’t the case historically—indeed, a shift towards more acceptance of rent control occurred after the publication of this 1995 article by Arnott.

5. Landlord-tenant relations are a provincial/territorial responsibility. According to my colleague Shibil Siddiqi, “Under the Constitution, property and civil rights are and have always been in the provincial domain. Accordingly, Ontario is responsible for regulating landlord-tenant relations and this hasn’t changed much at all over the years. Historically landlord-tenant law was seen as a subset of property law.”[2]

6. If Avi were to follow through on his commitment to “legislate new tenant protections,” his new government could find itself in court. That’s because one or more provinces might take legal action, arguing that newly enacted federal legislation infringes on provincial powers granted under the Constitution Act, 1867.

7. Any federal attempt to move forward on this would likely use up precious political capital with provincial and territorial governments. If an Avi-led government were to spend 6-12 months trying to gain traction on this, that’s 6-12 months it could have been spending on a more workable intergovernmental partnership (such as this one).

8. Avi should consider supporting demand-side initiatives (i.e., giving people money so they can afford expensive rent). Shortly after Avi won the federal NDP leadership, Maytree released this very sensible Blueprint for a Canada Housing Benefit System, proposing a permanent, Canada-wide demand-side system. One advantage of demand-side initiatives is that they can take effect almost immediately—it’s faster to cut someone a cheque than it is to create new housing. Another is that they can be targeted to households most in need.

9. On the supply side, Avi Lewis could support a bold but realistic target for non-market renting. Approximately 4% of Canada’s total housing stock is non-market housing (also known as ‘social housing’ or ‘community housing’). As a long-term goal, some advocates believe this figure should rise to 20%—a bold but realistic long-term objective that would require 25,000 to 50,000 new non-market units annually (depending on how quickly we want to reach the 20% target).[3] Avi’s platform, by contrast, pitches 200,000 new non-market units annually over a five-year period.[4] It’s worth noting that in 2024, just 6,887 such units were created in Canada, while the most non-market units ever built in Canada in one year was 26,874 (in 1972).[5]

10. An advantage of non-market housing is that it keeps rent levels low over the long term, essentially serving as an organic form of rent control. The logic of this is straightforward: operators of non-market housing have a mandate to keep rent levels low over the long term (and if they ever sell the housing, they’re required to do so to a like-purpose entity). By contrast, for-profit landlords have a clear interest in raising rents to whatever levels the market will bear (for more on this issue, see this analysis).

In sum. Avi Lewis and his team ran a very successful leadership campaign. But if they’re serious about tackling housing affordability, they should consider pivoting away from federal rent control. Mild forms of rent control do have merit, but that’s a matter for our provincial and territorial governments. For the federal government, there are a great many other worthwhile strategies to pursue.

I wish to thank George Fallis, Ron Kneebone, Christina Maes Nino, Jenny Morrow, Allan Moscovitch, Steve Pomeroy, and Annick Torfs for assistance with this blog post.

[1] Avi’s housing platform also contains several other housing-related proposals, all of which can be reviewed here.

[2] S. Siddiqi, personal communication, January 6, 2015.

[3] See page 5 of this document.

[4] It seeks to create “one million social, co-op, non-profit and supportive homes within five years.”

[5] These figures can be found in Table 1 of this document.