Crafting the narrative: wealth migration, growth machines and the politics of housing affordability in Vancouver, Canada

Abstract

In many gateway cities–cities tightly locked into global flows of capital and people–immigration has become the largest component of population growth, and thus a major determinant of housing markets. In Vancouver, the arrival of wealthy migrants, many holding golden visas, plus significant offshore property investment, has contributed to rapid house price inflation. In a recent paper, Lauster and von Bergmann (2023) characterise local resistance to these trends as ‘housing nationalism’, which they consider reactionary and a cultural ‘moral panic’. In contrast, we demonstrate the scale of offshore investment, the economic basis of resistance and policy change, and the broad, multiethnic support behind efforts to limit foreign property ownership. In doing so, we show that the invocation of ‘housing nationalism’ is consistent with growth machine ideology that seeks to undercut opposition.