Where will all these promised new homes go?

As Canadians head to the polls on Apr. 28, federal parties are offering ambitious plans to build up Canada’s affordable housing stock in a hurry. But the devil is in the details, and Canada’s P&C insurance industry is waiting to see where all these new homes will go.

The industry is on record as saying governments at all levels need to avoid new development in high-risk hazard areas such as floodplains and forested areas (also known as the ‘urban wilderness interface’).

Insurance Bureau of Canada offered no comment about the parties’ housing plans before the election, preferring to wait until the outcome is known so they can focus on the incoming party’s specific housing platform. But an IBC report before the election raises the issue of making sure new and future developments are steered away from high-risk hazard areas.

“For nearly a decade, the P&C insurance industry has been calling on all orders of government to take action to adapt to Canada’s changing climate,” IBC says in its report, Lessons for Canadian policymakers from the California insurance crisis. “Core among the industry’s policy recommendations is mandating building resilience in new construction through building codes and ensuring that new development is restricted in high-risk hazard areas.”

Polling on Friday suggests the Liberals and the Conservatives are vying for the bulk of the popular vote. CBC News’ poll tracker, which calculates an average based on several polling results, shows a somewhat tightening race, with the Liberals’ average share of the popular vote at 42.3%, the Conservatives at 38.6%, the NDP at 8.6%, and the Bloc Quebecois at 6%.

It remains to be seen how the popular vote will translate into seat counts on election day.

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Both front-running parties, the Liberals and the Conservatives, have set ambitious targets for building new homes.

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The Liberals’ costed platform shows the plan is to double the pace of home construction in Canada, promising up to 500,000 new homes per year. Under this plan, the government would take on the role of developer, creating an agency called Build Canada Homes “to build affordable housing at scale, including on public lands,” according to the party platform.

The Liberals’ platform also revives the party’s commitment to its national flood program, for which it did not budget any funds in the latest iteration of the government’s budget prior to the election. According to the party’s platform, a Liberal government would “stand up Canada’s high-risk flood insurance program by April 2026 to support homeowners to reduce their exposure to future climate risk. We will expedite work with provinces, territories, and industry to finalize this low-cost program.”

For their part, the Conservatives pledge to build 2.3 million homes over the next five years.

“The federal government owns over 11,000 federal properties, many of them in prime urban locations near transit and jobs,” the Conservative Party’s costed platform reads. “A Conservative government will sell these federal lands in cities to developers who will build affordable homes quickly.

“We will identify 15% of federal land and buildings to sell in cities within the first 100 days of a new Conservative government.”

Wherever these new homes are built, Canada’s P&C insurers say hazard-mapping needs to improve for both flood and wildfire risk, which contributed to record natural catastrophe losses of almost $9 billion in 2024.

“Canada needs to invest in improved hazard mapping to support provinces and communities in identifying high-risk wildfire zones,” IBC notes in its report. “These maps should be made public and updated regularly to identify new areas at risk. This is essential to making proactive disaster-related decisions.”

David Gambrill

David has twice served as Canadian Underwriter’s senior editor, both from 2005 to 2012, and again from 2017 to the present.