PBO: Impact of the 2025-2027 Immigration Levels Plan on Canada’s Housing Gap 

Good assessment, particularly with projected outflows of temporary residents. Key findings:

• Assuming that the population evolves in line with the Government’s projection, we estimate that the 2025-2027 Immigration Levels Plan will reduce Canada’s housing gap in 2030 by 534,000 units (45 per cent). After accounting for the Government’s new immigration plan, we estimate Canada’s housing gap in 2030 to be 658,000 units.
• Combined with our updated baseline outlook of 1.7 million net housing completions, closing the housing gap in Canada would require a total of 2.3 million housing completions by 2030, which would translate into 390,000 total units completed annually, on average, over 2025 to 2030.
• We judge that there is significant risk to the demographic projection presented in the Government’s new immigration plan—particularly to the projected outflow of non-permanent residents. Our estimated reductions in household formation and the housing gap are uncertain and likely represent upper-bound estimates.

On October 24, the Government released its 2025-2027 Immigration Levels Plan (ILP), which included permanent resident targets and, for the first time, temporary resident targets for international students and temporary foreign workers. For permanent residents, the plan highlights a decrease in permanent resident admissions from 464,265 in 2024 to 395,000 in 2025, 380,000 in 2026 and 365,000 in 2027. For non-permanent residents (NPRs), the plan presents arrival targets set with the goal of reducing the number of NPRs to 5 per cent of Canada’s population by the end of 2026.

Given the immigration targets announced in this plan, the Government projects that the Canadian population will decline by 0.2 per cent in both 2025 and 2026, before returning to population growth of 0.8 per cent in 2027. If the population evolves as the Government projects, it will be the first time Canada experiences an annual decline in its population. Although the ILP projects fewer permanent resident admissions and fewer NPR arrivals, the projected decline in the population will be driven by large outflows of NPRs. Excluding individuals who will transition to permanent residency, the plan assumes that 2.8 million temporary residents will leave the country over the next 3 years—equivalent to 93 per cent of the current NPR population….

Source: Impact of the 2025-2027 Immigration Levels Plan on Canada’s Housing Gap