Keeping the Canadian dream of home ownership within reach has become a key issue in the 2019 federal election and rightly so. Home ownership rates in Canada are on the decline for the first time in history as young families struggle to do what generations before them have done — buy a home.
Among all of the ideas to support affordable homes, three parties — the Conservative Party, the Liberal Party and the New Democratic Party — have committed to addressing the problem of money laundering in the Canadian housing market. One of the solutions that has been put on the table is the creation of a beneficial ownership registry.
The registry would require companies, trusts and partnerships to publicly disclose controlling shareholders, beneficial owners and partners so everyone would know who purchased a property.
Ontario realtors have been fighting to get dirty money out of Canadian real estate and we are pleased to see growing momentum behind a beneficial registry. It would allow law enforcement, tax authorities, media and everyday citizens to search for properties of corrupt officials, their families or people they may know who are involved in money-laundering crimes, and better connect money from criminal acts overseas to property purchased in Canada.
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