Dark money drives housing market

Re Wynne to hit foreign buyers with 15% tax, April 20

I doubt these changes will have much effect on the Toronto housing bubble, bearing in mind that no level of government is truly interested in putting on the brakes.

None of the traditional solutions are likely to work, as the real issue is the trillions of dollars of dark money sitting in offshore tax havens. This money is always seeking a secure place, with minimal controls, into which it can be laundered, and Canada, and in particular Toronto and Vancouver, are the perfect markets with their opaque registration requirements.

The beneficial ownership of real estate assets and corporations is easily hidden in Canada, and there has been no interest in the past to flush out the use of dark money in the real estate market. This is why Canada is currently the tax haven of choice. The drop in the dollar over the past few years has been a major accelerant for the inflow of hot money.

The federal government has been only too happy to allow this inflow of cash into the real estate market to offset our poor export performance. The cooling London real estate market has also contributed to the movement of funds into Canada.

Building more housing without restricting the vast inflow of hot money is not a viable solution.

Don Buchanan, Etobicoke