What the One-Year Scorecard Means for Homeowners Watching the Next Federal Move
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The Angus Reid Institute released its "Election +365" survey today, April 27, 2026, and the headline number for Canadians who own a home is the one written in red ink. Two-thirds (67%) say the Carney government has fallen short on improving housing affordability one year after the federal Liberals' return to power. Seventy per cent say the same about the high cost of living. Foreign policy and trade got tighter grades. Affordability did not.
This is a sentiment number, not a market number. But sentiment numbers shape the political math behind the next budget, the next federal–provincial deal, and the next round of homeowner-relevant rebates. When a clear majority of voters tell pollsters the central pocketbook file has missed the mark, pressure does not dissipate. It migrates to the next document the government tables. For existing homeowners watching mortgage renewals, retrofit incentives, and supply-side policy, the timing matters.
The poll lands on the eve of Finance Minister François-Philippe Champagne's spring economic update, scheduled to be tabled this week, with the main budget moved to the fall. The scorecard is not a verdict on year one. It is a pressure reading on year two.
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Sixty-seven per cent of Canadians say the federal government has fallen short on housing affordability, and 70% say it has fallen short on the cost of living, according to the Angus Reid Institute. Both numbers sit well above any other dissatisfaction reading in the survey, including immigration (49%) and climate change (44%).
The dissatisfaction reaches into the government's own coalition. Half (50%) of past Liberal voters say the government has fallen short on housing, and 54% say the same on the cost of living. Among past Conservative voters, the rate climbs to 86% on cost of living. Among past NDP voters, 64%. This is not a partisan complaint dressed up as a poll number. It is a base-and-opposition consensus that the affordability file is not where it needs to be. Mortgage renewals are the household-level expression of the same pressure: a recent TD Bank survey found two-thirds of Canadian homeowners anxious about their next renewal, with more than half planning to cut spending.
The contrast inside the poll is the part worth pausing on. Carney's overall approval sits at 58%, a respectable first-year reading that exceeds Stephen Harper (55%) and Paul Martin (51%) at the same point in their tenures, though it trails Jean Chrétien (66%) and Justin Trudeau (65%). Most respondents say the government has met or exceeded expectations on Canada's international reputation (64%), trade diversification (57%), defence spending (59%), and managing the relationship with the U.S. president (56%). Affordability stands out not because everything is failing — it isn't — but because everything else is roughly hanging together while housing and cost of living are not.
Looking forward, the priority list compresses further. Half (52%) of Canadians say reducing the cost of living is the biggest challenge facing the government over the next twelve months. Three-in-ten (31%) point to managing the U.S. relationship. Just under one-fifth (19%) name housing affordability as the single top challenge — a smaller number, but only because the broader cost-of-living frame absorbs most of the housing concern that would otherwise land here.
Sixty-seven per cent of Canadians say the federal government has fallen short on housing affordability, and 70% say it has fallen short on the cost of living, according to the Angus Reid Institute. Both numbers sit well above any other dissatisfaction reading in the survey, including immigration (49%) and climate change (44%).
The dissatisfaction reaches into the government's own coalition. Half (50%) of past Liberal voters say the government has fallen short on housing, and 54% say the same on the cost of living. Among past Conservative voters, the rate climbs to 86% on cost of living. Among past NDP voters, 64%. This is not a partisan complaint dressed up as a poll number. It is a base-and-opposition consensus that the affordability file is not where it needs to be. Mortgage renewals are the household-level expression of the same pressure: a recent TD Bank survey found two-thirds of Canadian homeowners anxious about their next renewal, with more than half planning to cut spending.
The contrast inside the poll is the part worth pausing on. Carney's overall approval sits at 58%, a respectable first-year reading that exceeds Stephen Harper (55%) and Paul Martin (51%) at the same point in their tenures, though it trails Jean Chrétien (66%) and Justin Trudeau (65%). Most respondents say the government has met or exceeded expectations on Canada's international reputation (64%), trade diversification (57%), defence spending (59%), and managing the relationship with the U.S. president (56%). Affordability stands out not because everything is failing — it isn't — but because everything else is roughly hanging together while housing and cost of living are not.
Looking forward, the priority list compresses further. Half (52%) of Canadians say reducing the cost of living is the biggest challenge facing the government over the next twelve months. Three-in-ten (31%) point to managing the U.S. relationship. Just under one-fifth (19%) name housing affordability as the single top challenge — a smaller number, but only because the broader cost-of-living frame absorbs most of the housing concern that would otherwise land here.
The survey was conducted online from April 15–20, 2026, with a randomized sample of 2,013 Canadian adults drawn from the Angus Reid Forum. The sample was weighted by region, gender, age, household income, and education to mirror the Canadian census, with respondents drawn from all 343 federal ridings. A probability sample of this size would carry a margin of error of roughly ±2 percentage points, nineteen times out of twenty.
These are mainstream, credible methodology choices. The 67% and 70% affordability and cost-of-living readings are not artifacts of a thin sample or a regional skew. The story is national.
Voter dissatisfaction on housing affordability sits on top of a measurable construction reality. The Canada Mortgage and Housing Corporation reported that the seasonally adjusted annual rate of housing starts dropped 6% in March 2026, falling to 235,852 units from 250,961 in February, according to a CMHC summary in the Journal of Commerce. The six-month moving average also slipped, from 255,874 to 248,378.
That direction matters because the campaign promise it is being measured against is large. The Liberal platform pledged "the most ambitious housing plan since the Second World War," with a stated target to double Canada's residential construction rate to 500,000 homes per year over the decade. With March 2026 starts running near the mid-200,000s — and CMHC's most recent baseline outlook pointing to starts staying below the 2021 record through 2026 — the gap between pledge and pace is the headline supply story behind the headline poll story. Recent Homeowner.ca analysis of CMHC research underscores the math: without roughly 28,000 additional starts per year, demand-side incentives risk pushing prices higher rather than easing them.
The reasons are structural, not just political. Higher interest rates and tightened financing have made many multi-unit and rental projects unfeasible, according to CMHC's Spring Housing Market Outlook, contributing directly to lower apartment starts and an overall decline in the new-build pipeline. Rental markets remain tight, and rents continue rising amid strong population growth. None of those drivers move on a one-year political clock.
For an existing homeowner, the immediate read-through is twofold. A slower supply pipeline keeps both ownership and rental markets under price and rent pressure, which protects asset values but adds to the family-affordability strain that shows up in the poll. And the mortgage backdrop — elevated rates that throttle developer feasibility — is the same backdrop that drives renewal stress for households re-pricing fixed-rate mortgages from a low-rate era into a higher-rate one.
Voter dissatisfaction on housing affordability sits on top of a measurable construction reality. The Canada Mortgage and Housing Corporation reported that the seasonally adjusted annual rate of housing starts dropped 6% in March 2026, falling to 235,852 units from 250,961 in February, according to a CMHC summary in the Journal of Commerce. The six-month moving average also slipped, from 255,874 to 248,378.
That direction matters because the campaign promise it is being measured against is large. The Liberal platform pledged "the most ambitious housing plan since the Second World War," with a stated target to double Canada's residential construction rate to 500,000 homes per year over the decade. With March 2026 starts running near the mid-200,000s — and CMHC's most recent baseline outlook pointing to starts staying below the 2021 record through 2026 — the gap between pledge and pace is the headline supply story behind the headline poll story. Recent Homeowner.ca analysis of CMHC research underscores the math: without roughly 28,000 additional starts per year, demand-side incentives risk pushing prices higher rather than easing them.
The reasons are structural, not just political. Higher interest rates and tightened financing have made many multi-unit and rental projects unfeasible, according to CMHC's Spring Housing Market Outlook, contributing directly to lower apartment starts and an overall decline in the new-build pipeline. Rental markets remain tight, and rents continue rising amid strong population growth. None of those drivers move on a one-year political clock.
For an existing homeowner, the immediate read-through is twofold. A slower supply pipeline keeps both ownership and rental markets under price and rent pressure, which protects asset values but adds to the family-affordability strain that shows up in the poll. And the mortgage backdrop — elevated rates that throttle developer feasibility — is the same backdrop that drives renewal stress for households re-pricing fixed-rate mortgages from a low-rate era into a higher-rate one.
The Angus Reid poll finds Canadians evenly split on whether the government has delivered on its election promises overall — 41% say it has fallen short, 41% say it has met expectations or better. That is a more forgiving headline than the affordability number, but the asymmetry is the point: the broader pledge book gets a passing grade; the housing pledge book does not. For homeowners, the question is which specific commitments have actually shipped and which are still drafting.
Build Canada Homes, the federal agency launched in September 2025 to scale affordable supply, is the most active piece. The Prime Minister's Office announced on April 23, 2026 that Build Canada Homes had approved eight Ottawa projects for more than 1,100 affordable rental homes, part of an Ottawa partnership announced last December that targets up to 3,000 mixed-income homes overall. Across the country, the agency has committed to more than 10,000 units, with over 1,400 homes already under construction or breaking ground in the next two months. Provincial partnerships have followed in British Columbia, New Brunswick, and Ontario — the last paired with a federal-provincial agreement to halve municipal development charges for three years, which the federal government estimates can lower the cost of building a two-bedroom apartment in Ottawa by more than $15,000.
The retrofit-and-rebate file looks different. The Canada Greener Homes Grant — the flagship homeowner retrofit program — fully subscribed earlier than planned and closed to new intake in February 2024 after more than 520,000 pre-retrofit EnerGuide evaluations, according to the Federal Sustainable Development Strategy update. Resources shifted to processing existing applicants, and a successor Canada Greener Homes Affordability Program launched in fall 2024. Natural Resources Canada has reported the original Greener Homes Grant helped over 165,000 households upgrade their homes, with average annual energy-bill savings near $386 per home and grants of up to $5,000 for eligible upgrades.
The number of households that benefited is real. The number who could still apply, today, on the original grant, is zero — and as our reporting on Carney's reaffirmed Greener Homes restart has documented, homeowners are still waiting for the funding mechanics to materialize.
The Oil to Heat Pump Affordability program is the cleaner example of "shipped." Grants of up to $10,000 for low- to median-income households heating with oil — rising to $15,000 in provinces that co-fund at least $5,000, plus a $250 pre-approval payment — remain operational, with estimated annual savings of $1,500 to $4,700 per converted household. It is a narrow, regionally concentrated program. But it is a homeowner rebate that exists in the world rather than in a campaign document.
The Angus Reid poll finds Canadians evenly split on whether the government has delivered on its election promises overall — 41% say it has fallen short, 41% say it has met expectations or better. That is a more forgiving headline than the affordability number, but the asymmetry is the point: the broader pledge book gets a passing grade; the housing pledge book does not. For homeowners, the question is which specific commitments have actually shipped and which are still drafting.
Build Canada Homes, the federal agency launched in September 2025 to scale affordable supply, is the most active piece. The Prime Minister's Office announced on April 23, 2026 that Build Canada Homes had approved eight Ottawa projects for more than 1,100 affordable rental homes, part of an Ottawa partnership announced last December that targets up to 3,000 mixed-income homes overall. Across the country, the agency has committed to more than 10,000 units, with over 1,400 homes already under construction or breaking ground in the next two months. Provincial partnerships have followed in British Columbia, New Brunswick, and Ontario — the last paired with a federal-provincial agreement to halve municipal development charges for three years, which the federal government estimates can lower the cost of building a two-bedroom apartment in Ottawa by more than $15,000.
The retrofit-and-rebate file looks different. The Canada Greener Homes Grant — the flagship homeowner retrofit program — fully subscribed earlier than planned and closed to new intake in February 2024 after more than 520,000 pre-retrofit EnerGuide evaluations, according to the Federal Sustainable Development Strategy update. Resources shifted to processing existing applicants, and a successor Canada Greener Homes Affordability Program launched in fall 2024. Natural Resources Canada has reported the original Greener Homes Grant helped over 165,000 households upgrade their homes, with average annual energy-bill savings near $386 per home and grants of up to $5,000 for eligible upgrades.
The number of households that benefited is real. The number who could still apply, today, on the original grant, is zero — and as our reporting on Carney's reaffirmed Greener Homes restart has documented, homeowners are still waiting for the funding mechanics to materialize.
The Oil to Heat Pump Affordability program is the cleaner example of "shipped." Grants of up to $10,000 for low- to median-income households heating with oil — rising to $15,000 in provinces that co-fund at least $5,000, plus a $250 pre-approval payment — remain operational, with estimated annual savings of $1,500 to $4,700 per converted household. It is a narrow, regionally concentrated program. But it is a homeowner rebate that exists in the world rather than in a campaign document.
Track the supply pledge separately from the rebate file. The "double construction" promise is a decade-long target measured against monthly CMHC starts. The retrofit and heat-pump files are program-level commitments — but the original Greener Homes Grant is closed, the successor is income-targeted, and the homeowner-relevant restart announced earlier in April has yet to translate into open application windows.
Three near-term moments will translate the poll's pressure into policy. The first is this week's spring economic update, scheduled to be tabled in late April, which will set the federal accounting and signal which housing and rebate envelopes are getting fresh dollars before the main fall budget. The second is the fall budget itself, the next full opportunity to respond to the affordability scorecard with multi-year line items — and the moment political incentives most clearly align with action.
The third is the federal–provincial partnership track, where housing supply is being unlocked through deals like the $8.8-billion Canada–Ontario commitment to halve development charges rather than through a single federal program. That model is now the most direct lever for moving new-build prices in the markets where homeowners' own properties are valued.
For homeowners, the practical reading list is small. Watch for any reset of homeowner-targeted retrofit funding now that the original Greener Homes Grant is closed and the successor program is income-targeted. Watch for whether Build Canada Homes graduates from its first round of provincial agreements into the broader supply numbers that would actually move CMHC's starts trend. And watch for whether other provinces follow Ontario into a development-charge framework, which is the lever that most directly affects new-build prices in the markets where homeowners' own properties are valued.
Sentiment is a leading indicator. Policy is the lagging one. The 67% number is the political backdrop the next federal document will be drafted against — not the verdict on what came before, but the pressure pushing the next thing to be larger, faster, and more visible to the homeowner watching their renewal letter and their property tax bill at the same time.
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About the Author
Ryan is the founder of Homeowner.ca and a proud Canadian homeowner based in Guelph, Ontario. Over his 25-year career in digital publishing, he has focused on transforming complex information into clear, practical guidance that helps people make confident, well-informed decisions.
