True Patriot Love - Why Renovating Old Homes Could Fix Canada’s Housing Crisis

00:00:00.000 Wow, that's a lot of homes in Canada that are actually sitting at the 77, 50-year mark.

00:00:10.380 Now, homes aren't really meant to, you know, I always say this on the show, you know, your home's not,

00:00:15.820 and people make this mistake all the time when they're talking, my home's going to last forever.

00:00:20.160 No, your home isn't going to last forever, right?

00:00:23.720 I'm sorry.

00:00:24.560 I've done this enough with my dad.

00:00:25.760 i want you to know this is such terrible news to a guy who lives in a 110 year old house

00:00:30.880 no no but held together by band-aids from 1950.

00:00:38.880 well building building building i'm here with my friend mike to talk about renovation

00:00:43.760 versus new homes so hey mike how's it going well this is a great topic uh at any given

00:00:49.200 time a homeowner i think sits on the precipice of fix this or find something already fixed yeah but

00:00:57.520 that reality i think is slipping a little bit you know uh and it's definitely weighing to one side

00:01:03.600 now yeah well for a number of reasons right so affordability you know we saw we saw home prices

00:01:10.320 look like they were going to rebound new sales uh coming into june july and then we did it on

00:01:18.080 another show at the beginning of august home sales just crumbled right so all the increases that we

00:01:24.480 had saw for the first half of the year were really lost in the first half of august right so so people

00:01:30.800 got cold feet again they said okay i don't know what i'm going to do i'm not going to sell my

00:01:34.960 house i'm not going to actually buy a new house so what do i do i accept my old house yeah sure

00:01:42.080 Sure enough, the Home Depot just down the street from me is so funny because I think everybody knows my wife at Winters and everybody knows me at Home Depot.

00:01:52.420 Like, I think we're highly identifiable characters.

00:01:55.260 But Home Depot this summer, compared to other years at that same Home Depot, seemed to be pretty busy, Paul, to be honest with you.

00:02:04.280 The parking lot was full constantly.

00:02:06.940 The garden center, the landscape area, the summer was active.

00:02:12.080 I think you might be right. I think people are looking at where they live as the place they're going to stay.

00:02:18.880 Yeah. Well, you know, it's interesting, too, Mike.

00:02:21.120 You know, I was a little bit of a building historian, as I mentioned on previous shows, you know, grew up with a dad who liked to tinker with homes.

00:02:31.020 So spent a lot of time in older homes, renovating and gutting and rebuilding.

00:02:36.260 So, you know, a couple of things, you know, I learned over the years was most of our home development,

00:02:42.360 or a lot of our home development in Canada was done in the 1950s.

00:02:46.260 Why is that? That was like post-war?

00:02:48.060 Post-war, people had more of an interest to live in single dwellings, quite frankly.

00:02:54.880 They were at lower cost. People had rising wages.

00:02:59.460 So it was a beautiful time in the world where, you know,

00:03:02.560 baby boomers were picking up that time when uh costs were reasonable and wages were increasing

00:03:08.400 we were building infrastructure that was brand new in these subdivisions that were

00:03:12.160 our original communities throughout the i guess around the big cities in canada yeah yeah so you

00:03:18.000 know we were we were in the 50s we were building homes 60 of all our building was uh single

00:03:23.600 dwellings okay so here we are you know building a bunch of single dwellings we get into the 60s

00:03:29.200 and then the apartment boom i don't know you know the six plex apartment boom

00:03:33.200 you know you go to any city and you see those low-scale apartments you know what you see them

00:03:37.520 still is in that sort of um it's almost like a a ring around most cities where between the actual

00:03:46.400 apartment dwellings and condos and things and the single uh single unit dwellings there's

00:03:53.600 some of these still in existence now yeah you know like in toronto and weston and areas like that

00:03:59.200 you'll still see the low-rise apartment complexes all around all around and then so what happened

00:04:04.320 mike you know we came into the 70s and all these people who had come they had immigrated here

00:04:10.000 they've gotten on their feet and then there was another push in the 70s um and then we had high

00:04:15.360 interest rates in the 80s and that was a bubble we had to get through and then once we got through

00:04:20.560 that again we started building single uh unit homes single residents again so we had really

00:04:26.640 two big pushes for single single units single residential units in canada you know one in the

00:04:33.360 50s and one in the 70s and partially in the 80s right yeah now in the 80s we started to do

00:04:38.640 subdivisions like real subdivisions exactly i remember all my friends i grew up in woodbridge

00:04:43.360 all of my friends lived in a subdivision i lived in a single family dwelling yeah by the river

00:04:48.720 yeah down by the river but uh my friends all lived in these fancy brand new homes

00:04:54.560 in subdivisions that were laid out very beautifully and it made me quite jealous that they lived in

00:05:00.380 these you know bucolic neighborhoods uh but that was kind of the last boom before the bubble began

00:05:07.440 right the 90s were slow right you know the times you know everything the lights kind of turned off

00:05:14.000 in the beginning of the 90s and so uh builders were in trouble so a lot of you know my dad's

00:05:19.280 friends and people that we had kind of grown up with had overextended themselves going into the

00:05:24.060 90s and they were they got plowed so a lot of the older guys who were building at that time

00:05:28.040 got out of it quite frankly because they lost a ton of money when they because they were they

00:05:32.580 were picking up so many older homes and turning them so rapidly when the lights went out in the

00:05:38.620 early 90s they really got hurt and you hear that a lot of a lot of older italian families tell the

00:05:44.180 story about how you know their father got caught with uh 10 or 15 homes that he couldn't get rid

00:05:49.900 and he lost most of what he had made over the last couple decades yeah and you know the ones

00:05:54.140 that actually bought land at that time uh they were smart because that turned into development

00:05:59.980 and uh you know many people in the you know the outskirts of toronto even as far as pickering

00:06:05.340 uh the same sort of thing and ottawa happened you know yeah there were farms they would buy farms

00:06:11.580 well you know it's interesting because we think that there was some brilliance in their thinking

00:06:15.820 and um it's kind of funny because uh i spent a bunch of time with uh farmers in in over the

00:06:23.980 years and quite frankly a lot of them were from where i was from or where my family was from and

00:06:30.300 quite frankly the only reason they went and bought farms is because back in the old country they

00:06:34.540 farmed so if they were goat farmers they went and bought land this is so they were horse farmers they

00:06:39.260 went and actually bought you know farms that's all they knew and so paul you hit it on the head man

00:06:44.860 all of my friends grandparents came here did what they could to retirement oh up and they all and

00:06:51.260 they all shared this land where they would go they would have enormous gardens because and then you

00:06:57.260 go to their homes which was you know up by saint peter's church there in woodbridge in a subdivision

00:07:02.300 and the backyard was the entire garden yes it was the culture it was the culture but you're right

00:07:07.660 it wasn't really uh uh an investment purchase it was a lifestyle purchase yeah and these kids

00:07:14.060 became the lucky sperm club right yeah all of a sudden all of a sudden that you know uh dad bought

00:07:19.820 this you know 50 70 100 acres of land you know because he wanted to actually raise goats oh and

00:07:26.300 that's now new market congratulations yeah exactly right and you know they were all showing up you

00:07:31.820 know uh newfound wealth yeah uh which good for them right good what a great what a great way to

00:07:38.220 get it actually you know uh that transition of culture at the time and yeah yeah not a you know

00:07:43.500 but strategy i'm not sure no i don't know right i don't i think you can kind of count on a bunch

00:07:47.740 of things i love that about this episode today that was a great discovery because i think you're

00:07:51.580 right so now we're going into the new millennium right so the new millennium happens but now the

00:07:57.020 new millennium is all about condos high-rises big apartments big big big right build it big

00:08:03.500 so you know then you started meeting it was interesting because i don't think i had met a

00:08:08.060 lot of really uh what i call um insane developers until the new millennium and then you would be

00:08:15.980 you'd be sitting in a restaurant the guy would walk in his hair would be on fire and you think

00:08:19.820 and you say to someone who is that and they'd say oh he's building that huge high-rise you know and

00:08:24.940 i call them i call them crazy right okay never mind have you met harry stinson sorry i know we

00:08:30.540 hate to drop names but i can with great experience personally tell you that that was the greatest

00:08:35.420 experience i had with a developer did marketing for the guy he was doing one king west which was

00:08:40.540 a bank being and one of the first condo hotel developments very forward-thinking guy and he

00:08:46.620 continues to do this but it was i mean high-flying fast-moving intense anxiety development oh well

00:08:56.460 you have to you think of all the risks right you think of all you know if you're a high-rise builder

00:09:00.620 you know you're you're walking a tightrope you know hundreds of millions of dollars yeah you

00:09:06.380 know uh accident uh financing sales there's so many there's so many risk factors that go into

00:09:13.740 your life you know you have to be uh such a risk taker and and to do it and that was the first

00:09:19.580 time we started to see them and it was interesting because then we saw one then two then three then

00:09:24.380 four so it's pretty soon we had 50 or 60 groups in toronto and and vancouver and all the major cities

00:09:30.860 in montreal building these major high-rises everywhere right so then boom they're all going

00:09:35.500 to up and and you know the residential developer over time kind of faded away right there was a few

00:09:43.180 left but but you know quite frankly the it became kind of uh smaller companies i'd say there's a

00:09:49.740 couple majors but uh more mostly right in that time small developers became enormous developers

00:09:56.780 very quickly yeah yeah they did well depending on their risk appetite right and how much success

00:10:01.580 they had at the time exactly so you know i i'm going to kind of bring this back to home depot

00:10:06.940 but you know you look at it so we talked about you know the canadian history of building

00:10:13.980 for homes and single residential homes um you know the 50s and 80s

00:10:20.380 you know 70s and eights so now you're taking a look and you're thinking okay wow that's a lot

00:10:24.940 of homes in canada that are actually sitting at the 77 50 year mark yeah now homes aren't really

00:10:36.060 meant to you know i always say this on the show you know your home's not and people make this

00:10:40.780 mistake all the time when they're talking to my home's going to last forever no your your home

00:10:45.420 isn't going to last forever right i'm sorry i've done this enough with my dad i want you to know

00:10:50.380 this is such terrible news to a guy who lives in a 110 year old house no no but held together by

00:10:56.220 band-aids from 1950. but you you know if the older your home gets at some point you're gonna have to

00:11:02.300 rip it apart yeah right you're gonna have to you know redo the plumbing redo the electrical 100

00:11:08.140 if only for safety standards it's only for leaking foundations you know garage all those things all

00:11:14.460 got to get redone yeah now you can keep the structure but you're going to have to build the

00:11:19.180 form like you know and that and people forget that and so what i think what we're seeing and

00:11:24.540 when i went into you know i saw the quarterly results for home depot and i think that's what

00:11:29.980 instigated the show okay right so yeah when you when you brought it up you're like i got an angle

00:11:34.940 and i'm like okay let's go well it was interesting because all all of a sudden you know uh first

00:11:40.380 quarter i saw all the um home retail repair companies really flat or down which made sense

00:11:48.860 to me it was slow so you know uh coming into march through winter i thought okay you know it makes

00:11:55.500 sense for down then i see the second quarter results come out you know the other day i'm

00:11:59.900 looking at me go oh they're back up well that makes sense summer i guess uh you know but i'm

00:12:06.380 thinking i don't know you know what is what is instigating them to grow and and they're saying

00:12:11.740 you know home sales are down to your point when we started off the show they said that's why people

00:12:18.220 are starting to renovate their homes again yeah and it makes sense because when uh i think they

00:12:23.740 made their quarterly statement and i thought uh ann marie campbell is one of the senior executives

00:12:30.300 at home depot and she basically said canada and mexico out comped the company so they did better

00:12:37.500 their comparables were better than the company so it was great to see after a slow first quarter

00:12:44.060 that canada kind of picked up again in their minds but then it was interesting uh she said

00:12:49.660 across the company comparable average ticket increased 2.8 during the quarter while comparable

00:12:56.940 transactions declined okay so that means the cost of things went up and fewer people bought them

00:13:03.980 so what happened so they had a they had two two two lines going in opposite direction right the

00:13:09.500 number of people purchasing went down but then what people were purchasing went up so whether

00:13:14.380 that doesn't mean that it was more profitable necessarily but because it might have been a

00:13:19.420 higher ticket item exactly yeah yeah and to your point some inflation's baked in there so that

00:13:24.540 pushed some of the costs up and so you know we're seeing uh an increase now overall the company

00:13:31.420 across north america saw a store-over-store increase about 1.7 percent which is good for them

00:13:36.860 they're still growing but you know it's interesting mike i kind of then dug into i was trying to

00:13:41.900 figure out what's happening with other companies now you know when you look at this this market

00:13:48.620 sector it's primarily dominated by american companies right that's true we have home depot

00:13:55.500 uh who owns rona rona is a new york fund it's a private equity fund okay um so they own it they

00:14:03.020 you know that was a big deal at the time well rona was a quebec company at one point right it was

00:14:08.140 founded in quebec um it did very well primarily in the lumber business uh and it flourished for

00:14:14.140 a number of years you know we also they had huge lumber yards you know because of uh where we're

00:14:19.340 located in quebec um so they did really well but uh they sold out uh to lowe's lowe's came in and

00:14:26.300 bought it for like 3.2 billion dollars um and then didn't do well no they lost didn't do well

00:14:32.860 and then they sold it to this fund actually for like 400 million uh so that was about an eighth

00:14:39.420 the value when they exited yeah so that's a that's a shameful deal right so you don't hear much about

00:14:45.260 they're they're pretty quiet i think they're trying to do a rebranding you know home hardware

00:14:51.020 and canadian tire they kind of tinker in the home renovation business they do some stuff in it but

00:14:57.100 you know i think they're they're trying to diversify themselves i was actually looking at

00:15:01.580 the canadian tire uh sales um they're slightly up so okay yeah so when they exclude petroleum

00:15:09.100 because you know canadian tire now is a bunch of things right oh yeah it's like uh sports check

00:15:13.500 it's got the party uh center it's got petroleum it's got mark's work warehouse yeah so it's got

00:15:22.060 all those you know so it's diversified it realized the need to diversify which is very interesting

00:15:28.620 because now given everything going on with tariffs um it'll be interesting to see where like a home

00:15:35.100 hardware and uh canadian tire actually pivot what's interesting because you pointed out

00:15:41.580 something i hadn't thought of before uh and that is the size of the stores generally speaking but

00:15:46.300 the difference between a home depot and a home hardware it's pretty significantly different

00:15:52.620 inside it's almost a more maintainable sustainable size oh i think honestly i think they're probably

00:15:58.620 the best suited now they're i think they're like a franchise model okay owned by store owners it's

00:16:03.100 a it's a hybrid model they they run on the home hardware side i think they're perfectly perfectly

00:16:09.180 situated to pivot now um given the the canadian tariff canadian american tariff issue and capitalize

00:16:17.340 on the home renovation well so like open up there uh if do more uh building supplies okay you know

00:16:26.700 because right now they're all rounder stores right so they create these all-rounder i think

00:16:31.020 canadian tire and home hardware because of the home depot being the giant in the market and then

00:16:36.700 lowe's being the giant right they had to find a market niche so they had to kind of diversify out

00:16:41.420 and kind of you know poke their head only where they could survive that makes sense you know

00:16:45.820 canadian tires are big right yeah so and so they had to work that model and figure that out i think

00:16:51.100 they've done a good job but now i think they have unique opportunity of pushing back more into the

00:16:57.100 building supplies and you know if you think about it mike you know i was i was trying to figure out

00:17:02.460 what happens now with tariffs because we've put tariffs on american goods yeah so you think

00:17:09.340 anything that has steel anything that has aluminum anything that's wood anything coming back into

00:17:15.180 canada is going to have a significant tariff on it which then opens up an opportunity for people

00:17:21.180 in canada to make those items we don't necessarily this is a really unique opportunity we're not

00:17:26.220 talking about on the building side we don't need anyone else no we have lumber we have steel we

00:17:34.860 have the ability we have the uh ability to we have stone ross ship it across country we have stone we

00:17:41.260 have minerals we have everything we need to limestone everything that we need we could

00:17:46.380 supply ourselves for the bill i think for the building industry right componentry maybe not

00:17:51.580 we need to manufacture it yeah so yeah you know anything that goes into a house we could build in

00:17:57.500 canada so we could be self-sufficient we don't need therefore and you know and again you know

00:18:03.500 i like this i'm not trying to be difficult with our american uh neighbors but you know if that's

00:18:10.300 the case and we're going to do this 50 50 tariff thing for a while you know it does open up great

00:18:16.060 opportunities for canadians to manufacture all the gadgets and gizmos and screws and bolts and nuts

00:18:23.740 that we get from other countries do it here and then actually sell it through our own distribution

00:18:29.420 arms what about this if it works here we could then take it south of the border if you get a

00:18:35.420 model that works perfect but i do like this idea because but they don't want us to go south of the

00:18:39.900 border right no yeah i can see but you know what i mean past tariffs this is an opportunity because

00:18:45.500 certainly the market here at home gives you it is a moment you're right to retool to make some

00:18:50.780 pretty basic things that we are bringing in at a higher tariff rate you know one of the things you

00:18:56.220 just made me realize okay so home uh uh canadian tire when you think of canadian tire what's the

00:19:01.980 first thing you think of a canadian tire as what you go there for uh well oil gas cars auto that's

00:19:09.820 that's where they started it right auto so now they have that when you go to home depot what will

00:19:15.740 you never find items for your car no never so the auto element so home and car i'm sorry they go

00:19:23.260 together check out your insurance you buy them together right you know all they have to do is

00:19:27.020 put a health club on they got the whole thing so but essentially you're right if they just widen

00:19:32.300 that scope extending properties making it an order system first so that you can get your lumber you

00:19:38.540 can get your buildings they really they really are poised actually to take a growth moment here

00:19:45.340 and then if they also set up the supply chain if they're also invested in new businesses that are

00:19:50.540 building the tchotchkes and the you know wood whatever and the glues and the adhesives and

00:19:56.140 things that are required this could be a behemoth moment for canadian tire oh yeah it's very

00:20:02.140 interesting you know i'm sure they're you know i'm sure we're not saying anything they're not

00:20:05.340 thinking about but but quite frankly you know them looking at uh you know them looking at a rona plus

00:20:13.020 partnership yeah that could that would actually be a really smart idea the lumber and building

00:20:17.740 element up against that exactly now now i can co-join the two and i can service that market

00:20:23.260 share uh you know the one thing i think the the new york fund did really well uh they actually

00:20:29.740 kept their headquarters for rona plus in quebec smart so i think they branded very well so i think

00:20:35.020 they were kind of understood they wanted to make sure that they they know where their market is

00:20:39.660 they canadianized it they you know they got rid of the lowe's name they went back into so i think

00:20:45.500 they've done a oh i forgot it was lowe's that's what happened rona became lowe's yeah yeah well

00:20:50.780 rose and then rona plus because they were trying to add more items on it again but but you know

00:20:55.660 it's an interesting time as you look at it because that market's bouncing around um but it's from a

00:21:01.020 homeowner's perspective so now here i am as a homeowner and you know i was trying to figure out

00:21:08.060 when it said people were spending less transact they were doing less transactions but they were

00:21:13.740 actually spending more per transaction so i went and i took a look and i said okay

00:21:19.820 where's lumber right now well lumber is relatively the same it had a slight drop in the first quarter

00:21:26.220 but it's kind of leveled out so it was orbital like five during covet it became a real issue

00:21:31.660 i think didn't it right there huge increase on lumber but you know roughly you can get better

00:21:37.020 pricing on it but you know a tube an eight foot two by four you know just regular soft construction

00:21:42.700 lumber is still four bucks okay so it's still up there it didn't drop down substantially to where

00:21:49.660 it was before but it hasn't made a massive increase from there no it's kind of stabilized

00:21:54.620 it's kind of stabilized steel keeps climbing i don't know why still keeps climbing but construction

00:22:00.860 steel keeps climbing so where do we get most of that steel from china i believe right uh well and

00:22:06.620 and quebec and quebec yeah the smelters and everything so we get a lot of it in hamilton

00:22:11.420 and you know around us but yeah yeah but again we don't need with where we are on the tariff side

00:22:18.060 as far as steel goes for the most part there's there's some specific steels we get from other

00:22:22.780 nations um we get lower price steel which is the one that comes from china because its quality

00:22:29.020 isn't as good as ours so it comes in there's another one russia comes in at a lower price

00:22:34.220 because of the the metallurgy involved exactly yeah exactly thank you for that and then so i

00:22:40.700 didn't know that i knew the word metallurgy yeah no no well done the uh but you know you look at

00:22:46.140 if i'm going to build right now still expensive so it's still costly to build so then i'm thinking

00:22:53.900 to myself okay well you know we're getting ready for the show and i'm thinking well people are

00:22:59.100 doing a little building because you see the numbers going up at least a little bit when

00:23:05.420 the major provider for home you know renovations um i'm not sure what's happening with the others

00:23:11.260 in the market so we might be just a market share take but you see it kind of stable and moving

00:23:15.820 along which which good for them um but people are still moving so if you want to get the the home

00:23:22.860 renovation market going wouldn't it make sense to start to stimulate lower costs that makes perfect

00:23:30.700 sense yeah so i'm so the interesting thing is we're talking about subsidizing all these industries

00:23:36.220 right now i'm looking at i'm thinking okay but is there a condition to actually reduce costs in the

00:23:41.580 marketplace so is there a condition to reduce lumber is there a condition to right reduce

00:23:46.700 steel is there a condition like what are we doing to put on that'll stimulate people to enter back

00:23:51.420 into the other words what's the government saying okay about domestic use domestic development of

00:23:58.460 these products yes you don't see that on almost every front to be honest with you paul not to

00:24:04.860 astray but on almost every front where we have obvious moments uh where we could flourish we

00:24:11.660 have the lumber we have the steel we have the aluminum we have the means where we could be

00:24:17.420 bringing this in we tend to want to make a deal to do it elsewhere instead you know that's that's

00:24:23.260 the canadian way right which is which is bizarre that's a mentality i think we really need to like

00:24:28.540 at least make a 90 degree shift on because if we don't pivot now we're just going to be making

00:24:35.180 great speeches and doing deals that are more costly to canadians more offensive to the america

00:24:40.300 we'd be better insulating by doing our own thing yeah i don't think we need to again do we need to

00:24:46.860 be fighting anymore you know we did this on our tariff show i don't think we need to have any

00:24:51.820 more conversations for a while i think we should basically call call a truce everyone go back to

00:24:57.900 their corner go off and start creating our own industries make ourselves as self-sufficient as

00:25:04.540 we can um let's see what we can do internally you know it's funny someone said the other day which

00:25:09.580 is interesting um you know we're gonna really focus now on internal trade barriers that's like

00:25:17.180 oh my goodness for the last year we've been talking about is this still not done is it still

00:25:22.620 not done come on we we're still having this conversation like you raise a good point seriously

00:25:28.460 how do we get a deal done with the us when between the provinces we can't even work it out

00:25:32.700 it seems like a a bridge too far right but but the the weird thing is now and everyone's

00:25:38.300 complaining okay you know housing is down this is down okay well you know what we have all the

00:25:43.980 materials across canada let's collectively reduce the barriers figure out where we can actually

00:25:49.420 harvest everything for a home and go to start to build homes now the interesting part this is the

00:25:55.980 crazy part which you know i don't know where this is going to end up uh you know and i'd love to

00:26:00.700 bring a statistician in or uh someone who can actually work with us to figure this out you have

00:26:06.460 a huge aging population right so 20 of our population is aging out our homes are aging out

00:26:15.100 no one can afford right now to build new homes so we're going to have a bunch of properties

00:26:23.200 coming on the market because they're going to have to leave they're going to be going into

00:26:28.960 retirement homes into nursing homes as the you know as they get older yeah where do these homes

00:26:34.060 end up and what because you know knocking them down and rebuilding them is not it you just can't

00:26:38.500 do it there it's not it's not it's not fiscally responsible to do that land values are still too

00:26:43.180 high construction costs are still too high you're not going to get that done i think i see where

00:26:46.940 you're going why wouldn't we make it better for canadians to make sure that these homes have

00:26:52.700 there's a solution for that moment well here's the here's the crazy thing in my mind so if you

00:26:58.620 did do that quite frankly number one you'd take care of that senior has equity so you wouldn't

00:27:03.100 let that equity diminish you know please you know stop doing all these crazy bylaw changes that

00:27:08.940 you're killing their equity but if you stop doing all that and you let them actually get out of

00:27:13.500 their homes transfer their homes to someone new who can then either renovate add on extend or

00:27:20.380 fix up that home so they're not living in a home that's falling apart with a 70 year old bathroom

00:27:25.180 right right then i think you give people a chance to get a home but right now they can't because

00:27:31.660 you can't you can't coordinate the two but the funny thing is now we're going to step in and

00:27:36.060 we're going to subsidize all these industries because of tariffs not thinking about the actual

00:27:41.660 homeowner yeah the actual we're we're we're we're focused on build canada where we're going to go

00:27:47.420 build you know i i ran into a couple the other day i'm like oh my goodness two dudes who have

00:27:54.300 received a grant to go build affordable housing or mixed use housing and i i wonderful nice guys

00:28:03.180 just wonderful nice guys freaking never built a home you could tell never built anything right

00:28:09.580 yeah so they got somehow they got the grant good good on them i guess i don't know let's see how

00:28:15.260 they do yeah but you know they're out there kind of working away and there's a ton of them you're

00:28:20.460 walking you're running into now you're running like as you're moving around now you know you're

00:28:24.700 going to parties and coffees and dinners and stuff yeah yeah you know i'm building uh this

00:28:29.740 plex and i'm building to that place and i'm doing i'm thinking oh my goodness have you guys ever

00:28:34.060 built anything anything like please well you know what other than other than the fact you you figured

00:28:39.820 out how to write a grant so if this you know you're good you got someone who can write a grant

00:28:44.540 congratulations you actually got to build the damn thing the solution is that we're going to give

00:28:48.860 money to new builders to create new homes but we're forgetting that creating a family legacy

00:28:56.620 home which by the way that was something when we were kids many people took their parents homes

00:29:03.020 they they would be with their parents they ended up taking their homes why don't we create something

00:29:09.020 well this is to tie to this why don't we create something that says before it's too late

00:29:15.580 qualify on windows and foundation and the bones of your home yeah and the you know environmental

00:29:22.300 status of your home. So it's like the envelope itself is feasible. But why don't we create

00:29:29.540 something for that? CMHC said 2026 mortgage consumer samples were most 5% of 2026 consumer

00:29:39.400 samples were repeat buyers. So only 5% were repeat buyers. 66% were renewers. Those aren't

00:29:49.440 population shares right that's because it specifically covers people who recently had a

00:29:55.800 mortgage yep and it illustrates how much mortgage activity involved is involved in people remaining

00:30:00.560 in their homes so at the same time 63 percent of mortgage consumers are planning renovations

00:30:05.960 63 percent and among people refinancing 32 percent say renovations are the reason for refinancing so

00:30:13.020 now uh that's up 28 now cmhc is looking at programs to suit renovation not gap your next

00:30:22.940 home purchase against the house you're selling right no no i think it's a great idea honestly

00:30:27.420 you know it's interesting because i would have loved and you know they didn't they came from an

00:30:31.340 era that my parents where they didn't want to do it where we tried to encourage them to come live

00:30:35.900 with us as they got older so and i think that would have been a tremendous idea i think the

00:30:40.780 option that they ended up taking i i don't i didn't like quite frankly i would have rather they

00:30:45.660 stayed with me and you know uh us our family as they got older but they didn't right so and i

00:30:52.380 think it was because they came from a generation where they were so proud to have home that 1950s

00:30:58.780 that 1970s you know where you know i this i bought my own my own home exactly until quite frankly

00:31:06.220 at the end you know he was calling my dad was calling me you know his basement was constantly

00:31:11.900 leaking uh there were troubles all the time so the house was having chimneys were falling down

00:31:18.300 uh you know bathrooms were overflowing you know it was like one thing after another and he couldn't

00:31:23.420 fix them so then you know we would go over and help him and i think i put two basement floors

00:31:28.620 in his basement and you know it just was one thing after another and the house was timing out

00:31:35.420 so it needed someone to take it and rebuild it again but we're in that mode now so if if we

00:31:41.820 are in that mode with i don't know let's say 50 of the houses in canada okay let's say 50

00:31:48.860 of the houses in canada are kind of timing out 20 of canadians are timing out right so that should

00:31:57.660 be a unique opportunity to match up a demand yeah that sounds right to me yeah so i don't know why

00:32:03.100 we can't talk about that it's it seems like something we don't want to talk new homes paul

00:32:07.500 no yeah well we have to build new homes i get it new home builders need to have again those are

00:32:12.860 nice but i gotta ask are you gonna buy a new home no i am i'm gonna be honest with you paul i am

00:32:18.380 never buying a new home again so i will have probably one more home right but it won't be a

00:32:25.580 custom it'll be a very basic home quite frankly it will be at a low scale because the only way

00:32:32.460 to resell it eventually unless uh my son takes it would be for that yeah right you know it won't it

00:32:39.260 would so why would why would i go build a beautiful luxurious custom home that's right now only losing

00:32:44.780 value by the month right it just it's every month i own it now it just goes down and down there's no

00:32:50.700 there's no appreciation on on custom large expensive homes no i think you have to be in a

00:32:55.580 reasonable home that will be part of the demand part of that small narrow demand exactly yeah

00:33:00.620 yeah but it's got to be affordable enough that they can buy it get into it and quite frankly and

00:33:06.700 you know well you know this world also the materials now like let's say that let's say

00:33:10.620 that you did a reno instead of building first of all i wrote this down before the show homes are

00:33:15.660 built substandard okay so you might as well renovate because there's probably some decent

00:33:21.020 bones on a good property so if you are going to renovate you need to go back down you probably

00:33:25.580 have to scale back as far in the home as you can go down to stud yeah and then build it back right

00:33:30.940 yeah so with the materials available today like it blew my mind i have to replace you know i had

00:33:35.820 an issue where the ice got in and pushed up a found and we looked at the foundation okay so now

00:33:41.580 that would have 10 15 years ago been a really serious situation pulling up the slab and getting

00:33:47.260 out and stuff there's three or four products now that change that world entirely so imagine

00:33:53.340 the renovation that you can do oh yeah and if you got 50 years out of the first build you might get

00:33:57.980 75 out of the next yeah yeah once you get the walls open you're going to figure out what's in

00:34:03.820 there how to clean it up to get the mold and the mildew the leaky pipes you know the substandard

00:34:09.900 electrical you know uh sewer lines you know water lines upgraded and expanded because they were so

00:34:17.500 small way back when yeah yeah so you know all those things that can give you better showers

00:34:22.060 better living conditions and build an extension on it and i know people hate it for zoning but you

00:34:27.820 know they're they're now allowing tons of add-on buildings onto homes that you can add on for

00:34:35.420 down the road for parents who are going to come live with you and things like that so i think

00:34:39.260 it does open up a world of possibilities and you don't have to go into that expensive land

00:34:43.820 acquisition which listen land's not budging too much we've seen land kind of bounce around but

00:34:49.660 but you know it's mostly the old homes that are depreciating right so quite frankly

00:34:54.220 if land's not going to change and building costs are not going to change so we're stuck where we

00:34:58.300 are you're not going to see a lot of new homes so you got to figure that out but

00:35:02.940 as we go to subsidy here's the thing like this what i'm trying to figure out in my mind right

00:35:06.700 now is we're doing this as government is kind of saying okay we're going to get involved in

00:35:10.860 this tariff thing and we're going to help all these industries in that they should be coming

00:35:15.740 out with a planner to match these up i would agree not provided because here's the crazy thing we're

00:35:22.220 doing affordable affordable housing mostly for new people new people to canada so we're spending all

00:35:28.060 this time you know we need affordable housing for new immigration for this okay what about existing

00:35:33.420 people who have been here paid taxes been here their whole life need to get their equity out of

00:35:38.620 their home need to get to a new home to live in uh or a home to live in need a strategy for life

00:35:44.940 based on that yeah isn't this the way to do it isn't this the way to kind of so so then you can

00:35:50.220 say to a young family you know what you you buy that fixer upper home but quite frankly renovation

00:35:56.540 costs will give you a a loan on your renovation costs and your materials your material rebate on

00:36:03.980 that is x and even create a rebate program on products so for example lumber use these nails

00:36:09.980 get this rebate use this get this you you you buy all canadian boom we got a solution if we can

00:36:18.060 figure it here's the thing if we can figure it out if we can start that conversation why are they not

00:36:24.060 doing it and that's what it scares me a little why are they not doing it they just have no interest

00:36:28.300 it's it's not on their purview because they're all living in a nice house and they're not worried

00:36:33.180 about it that's true you know it's interesting that you say this because if if um if everybody

00:36:38.460 if the opportunity was put there and you were told okay we can do this this is exactly what

00:36:44.620 our government loves doing it's not cash out the door it's a guarantee against a purchase

00:36:50.540 so we'll subsidize that we love doing that we don't like sending check although we do it too

00:36:55.900 often no government likes to just send checks to people against the purchase of a home it makes no

00:37:00.940 sense it doesn't work for the banks you know the other thing is when our parents built their first

00:37:05.100 home what was the interest rate at the bank for a mortgage 18 oh yeah 19 oh it was crazy remember

00:37:11.900 that that's what i mentioned in the 80s remember that huge interest rate that was like 18 you could

00:37:17.100 probably make a higher interest rate on renovation money because it's a lower amount and if you were

00:37:22.380 given a subsidy on the other side the banks recoup businesses start to come up and then the need for

00:37:27.900 worrying about that tariff vaporizes on certain items yeah well and and we replaced the need for

00:37:34.380 the supply chain is coming from other nations so all of a sudden we've created jobs we've targeted

00:37:40.780 housing like it just seems you know it seems like there's a solution here we're just not digging for

00:37:47.180 it i want everybody to visit paul's reno store pauls reno store.ca i think it's opening soon

00:37:54.860 i think it's a great perspective i'm glad we talked about this it actually makes me feel better

00:37:58.700 as a guy my age in a home i don't really want to have to worry about selling no i don't need that

00:38:06.540 strategy yeah if there's you know if i have a retirement strategy already and i can still be

00:38:11.740 comfortable in my home for a period of time thank goodness there's a senior's home next door it's

00:38:16.200 they don't they don't have to push me too far the kids but essentially it makes me feel better i

00:38:21.960 think many canadians would take stock in feeling better about their homes yeah i i do too thanks

00:38:28.320 Ball.

True Patriot Love - September 08, 2026

Why Renovating Old Homes Could Fix Canada’s Housing Crisis

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