Removing the ban on foreign investors - Conversations that Matter March 4, 2025

The topic of potential removal of the federal ban on foreign buyers came up in early March at a panel discussion organized by Stu McNish. I was pleased to participate on the panel along with Mike Hurley, the mayor of Burnaby, Neil Chrystal, Beau Jarvis, and Bob Rennie. Here is account of the discussion.

Prominent B.C. real estate marketer Bob Rennie says he has pitched prime minister-designate Mark Carney on encouraging foreign investment in rental housing development.

Speaking March 4 to a panel of developers at Conversations Live, an industry-sponsored event hosted by Postmedia, Rennie suggested an arrangement involving the Canada Mortgage Housing Corp. (CHMC), the taxpayer-backed Crown corporation that provides affordable housing financing and market-based mortgage insurance.

“I’m working with Carney – surprise – and I’m trying to get a rental program in where people can buy, put it into a 25-year pool, get a preferred rate from CMHC and let’s allow foreign buyers to buy it; they have to rent it out for 25 years and it will show the world we are open for business, because right now all of our governments are not showing that we’re open for business,” Rennie told the panel.

The panel happened to begin with a presentation by Research Co. pollster Mario Canseco, who began the discussion by noting the current federal government ban on non-Canadians (excluding international students) purchasing residential property has support of three in four Canadians.

“This is one of those rare occasions in which agreement spans across party lines,” he said.

Developer Michael Geller said the prevailing public sentiment on foreign ownership and resulting policy changes has been a factor in the pre-sale market drying up.

“As a result of all of that, all of the investors have left the market, and those are the people who were buying the pre-sales that all the … bankers are insisting upon,” Geller said.

gwood@glaciermedia.ca