Housing action plans: a guide for municipalities

How to develop a housing plan that addresses the specific needs of your community.

What is a Housing Action Plan?

A Housing Action Plan provides municipalities with a framework that allows them to implement strategies intended to create and develop market, affordable and non-market housing units.

What Does This Guide Offer?

The Guide for Canadian Municipalities for the Development of a Housing Action Plan (PDF) was designed to assist small municipalities in developing housing plans to address their specific housing needs.

Main sections:

  • Benefits of a Housing Action Plan
  • Key components of a Housing Action Plan
  • Steps to creating a Housing Action Plan
  • Importance of accurate housing research
  • Identification of barriers and opportunities
  • Tools to create housing in a community

A glossary of terms, municipal tools and approaches to creating housing, as well as data sources are also presented in the Guide.

Along with this Guide, a companion presentation is available to assist municipalities to develop or enhance a local Housing Action plan.

CMHC’s Experts

CMHC’s team of experts is dedicated to advancing housing solutions across Canada. These experts work with municipalities and the private, public and non-profit sectors at a local level to help create vibrant, healthy communities.

To help get your community started, we are available to make a presentation on how to use the guide and the resources that CMHC can provide. Contact a representative in your region.

Date Published: March 31, 2018