Ontario hit 58% of its housing target — here's what that means on your street
The province recorded 86,760 homes against a 2025 target of 150,000, even after widening what counts as a home. How the 1.5-million-home promise is tracking, why the miss is growing, and how to see what it looks like in your own neighbourhood.
Ontario's promise to build 1.5 million homes by 2031 has an annual scoreboard, and the latest reading is the worst yet. Against a 2025 target of 150,000 new homes, the province recorded 86,760 — about 58 per cent — according to figures reported by Global News. That's despite a definition of "home" that has been widened to include long-term care beds, retirement units, student housing, and basement apartments.
The trend line matters more than any single year. In 2023, the province narrowly beat its 110,000 target — after the definitional changes. In 2024 it managed just under 95,000 against a 125,000 target. In 2025, the bar rose to 150,000 and the output fell. Reports say only 13 municipalities met their provincial targets, and the finance minister has previously described 1.5 million as a "soft target."
The target didn't get missed because it was ambitious. Each year's shortfall was bigger than the last — the gap is compounding, not closing.
Why the miss is accelerating
The provincial scoreboard and the construction data tell one story. As we covered in the vanishing condo pipeline, the City of Toronto started just 156 condo units in the first half of 2026, and CMHC estimates Toronto alone needs 21,000 to 26,000 additional homes a year — a 50 per cent increase in pace — to restore 2019-level affordability by 2036. Condo pre-sales, the financing engine of most high-rise supply, have stalled; rental construction is growing fast but from a smaller base. Provincial legislation has focused on speeding approvals, but approvals were never the whole bottleneck — a project that doesn't pencil doesn't start, no matter how fast the permit comes.
That's worth remembering as housing promises fill the October 26 municipal ballot: the tools any Toronto politician actually controls — zoning, approvals, fees — shape what can be built, while rates, construction costs, and pre-sale markets decide what is.
The units that are quietly working
Inside the shortfall there's a hint of what does get built in a down market: the gentle-density stream. Basement apartments and garden suites now count toward the provincial numbers, and they're the housing an individual owner can still finance when a tower can't be. Toronto's pre-approved garden suite plans cut the design cost, and sixplexes are now permitted in much of the city without a rezoning — small numbers per project, but they start when big projects don't.
See the target from your street
Provincial percentages are abstract; permits aren't. To see what the housing push actually looks like around you, check the development applications near your address, then the building permits that show which ones went from paper to construction. The neighbourhood profile shows how much your area's housing stock has actually grown. And if there's a project you're watching — hoping it starts, or hoping it doesn't — set up monitoring and let the filings come to you.