The Empty Homes Tax works. Let’s make it stronger.

by Sean Orr

We need to strengthen the Empty Homes Tax. This is one of the best of the limited number of tools we have at the municipal level to both discourage real estate speculation and directly fund affordable housing initiatives. 

In the current housing crisis facing Vancouver, we can’t afford the status quo.

My motion is a practical way to make speculators and the rich pay to fund the housing we need. 

Ken Sim and ABC cut a planned increase to this tax back in 2023. But they didn’t stop at shooting down strengthening this common sense measure to discourage speculation and raise more money that goes directly to the City’s fund for social housing.

Believe it or not, they even gave millions of dollars back to wealthy developers – money that would have gone to those suffering the worst effects of Vancouver’s lack of affordability. 

It was “like a reverse Robin Hood tax,” then Councillor and now B.C. Minister of Housing Christine Boyle said at the time. Taking from the poor and working people of Vancouver to give to the rich.

I’m aiming to reverse all this. We can’t keep letting the rich steal from the poor in Vancouver. 

My motion, “Improving the Empty Homes Tax to Curb Speculation,” is a practical way to start to undo all the ‘Reverse Robin Hood’ measures ABC has pushed through over the past three years. 

COPE was the first party to make a proposal for an Empty Homes Tax in Vancouver central to our advocacy and campaigning, way back in 2014. At the time, many said it couldn’t be done. Then, in 2017, the Empty Homes Tax was implemented by Mayor Gregor Robertson and the Vision Vancouver administration. And it worked exactly as we said it would. 

The Empty Homes Tax has generated $169.8 million of net revenues between 2017 and 2023 to support affordable housing initiatives in Vancouver. This includes funding for public land acquisition, and essential contributions to non-profit housing initiatives that are providing desperately needed homes for poor, working class, and otherwise marginalized people in our community. 

The EHT isn’t a typical tax, in the sense that its goal isn’t actually to maximize the revenue it raises. Rather, it is primarily a tool to disincentive speculation, discouraging people to leave homes empty in the midst of a housing crisis. From 2017 to 2023, the number of known vacant properties in Vancouver decreased by 58%. 

In November 2020, a majority of Vancouver City Council, including then Mayor Kennedy Stewart and representatives from COPE, OneCity and the Greens, doubled the Empty Homes Tax to 3%. Then, in 2022, Council unanimously approved increasing the tax to 5% for 2023. Unfortunately, ABC later voted to cancel this planned increase. 

As you can see in the detailed reports the City publishes, the 2021 strengthening of the tax significantly decreased the number of homes being left empty over time. But there are still more than a thousand vacant homes. That’s unacceptable. 

One of the arguments against reversing ABC’s weakening of the Empty Homes Tax is that a higher tax rate will potentially lead to greater rates of tax evasion, and therefore require more money and staff for enforcement. But the EHT has always covered its own administration and enforcement costs while still generating tens of millions for affordable housing projects. 

Spending adequately on enforcement is good public administration, in my view. Workers don’t get to evade the taxes that get deducted from every inadequate paycheque, and renters can’t evade their landlords withdrawal of rent on the 1st of every month. Owners of multiple properties shouldn’t have any room to evade their legal obligations either. 

In Vancouver, we can’t afford to let the wealthy continue to live beyond our means. We need to prioritize opening up more homes for renters and the workers who make our city run. 

In my by-election platform, I promised to fight for housing and I specifically pledged to restore the Empty Homes Tax increase that ABC cancelled. 

We won the by-election by an overwhelming margin. Since then, we’ve continued to reach out and mobilize people across the City. This summer, over 1000 people have signed petitions to increase the Empty Homes Tax. 

In this housing crisis, we need to use every tool in our toolbox – and that’s what my motion to strengthen the Empty Homes Tax is all about.