Today in Vancouver, the Honourable Chrystia Freeland, Deputy Prime Minister and Minister of Finance, visited 58 West Hastings, which in May 2024 will begin welcoming its first residents into 231 new affordable rental homes for vulnerable people and low-income families. As first announced by the Deputy Prime Minister on July 28, 2021, this project was made possible in part by $45.8 million in federal funding from the Affordable Housing Fund-a key part of the government's economic plan to build more homes, faster.
58 West Hastings is a 10-storey building in Vancouver's Chinatown, which provides a mix of rental homes for people experiencing or at risk of homelessness, as well as low-income families. Rents at 58 West Hastings will be affordable, averaging $563 per month. When complete, the project will also be home to the Lily Lee Community Health Centre, an approximately 50,000 square foot integrated health facility to be operated by Vancouver Coastal Health.
As the next phase of the federal government's economic plan, the 2023 Fall Economic Statement takes further action to build more homes, faster, and make housing more affordable for Canadians.
This includes an additional $1 billion top-up to the Affordable Housing Fund, which will support non-profit, co-op, and public housing providers to build more than 7,000 new homes by 2028 through projects like 58 West Hastings, as well as a $15 billion top-up to the Apartment Construction Loan Program, which will support the construction of more than 30,000 additional new homes across Canada. In the Fall Economic Statement, the federal government is also taking steps to crack down on short-term rentals listed on sites like Airbnb, in order to help ensure homes are used for Canadians to live in.
The government is also supporting Canadians who are renewing their mortgages at a time of higher interest rates. The Canadian Mortgage Charter, as outlined in the Fall Economic Statement, highlights the tailored mortgage relief that the government expects banks to provide to borrowers who are facing financial difficulty with the mortgage on their principal residence.
