Residential Building Occupancy (RBO) Project – What We Heard Report

Date modified: June 2, 2026
Engagement period: November 18 to December 12, 2025
Respondents: 287 municipalities across Canada

Overview

Canada continues to face significant housing pressures resulting from limited supply, increasing demand, and gaps in the availability of timely and consistent housing information. As part of the Modernizing Housing Data (MHD) initiative, Statistics Canada is working with federal, provincial/territorial, and municipal partners to improve the availability and consistency of housing data.

The Residential Building Occupancy (RBO) Project is exploring new ways to collect and integrate information on residential building occupancy while minimizing reporting burden for municipalities. To inform this work, Statistics Canada invited municipalities to complete an online e-form about their current data collection practices, challenges, and capacity to share residential building permit information.

This report summarizes what we heard from participants.

Consultation objectives

Through the e-form, Statistics Canada sought to:

  • Understand the type, format, and availability of housing construction and occupancy data currently collected by municipalities.
  • Assess the alignment between municipal practices and proposed RBO approaches, including the use of administrative data sources and potential Application Programming Interface (API) based solutions.
  • Identify gaps, barriers, and challenges that may limit the ability to provide timely, record level data.
  • Gather suggestions on how to make data submission efficient for municipalities.

Who participated

A total of 287 municipalities responded to the e form, representing a wide range of community sizes and administrative capacities across Canada. Respondents included municipalities that issue building permits, manage occupancy inspections, maintain assessment rolls, or oversee construction oversight processes.

Participation was broadly distributed across provinces, with some regions more heavily represented than others. At the time of reporting, responses from Quebec and New Brunswick had not yet been collected and are not reflected in the findings presented here.

Key findings

Across the country, municipalities demonstrated strong interest in improving housing data, while also identifying common operational and resource-related challenges.

Municipal collection of residential occupancy data

  • Most municipalities collect some data at various stages of residential construction.
  • Many collect record-level data through their building permit systems, rather than in standalone datasets.
  • Collection practices vary widely, and some municipalities do not currently track residential occupancy in a structured way.

Inspections and occupancy as key data triggers

  • Inspections and occupancy permits are central triggers for tracking construction activity.
  • The most commonly reported indicators include:
    • First inspection marking the start of construction
    • Final inspection confirming completion
    • Issuance of an occupancy permit

Municipal reporting capacity and timeliness

  • While reporting capacity exists, many municipalities indicated they could provide data:
    • On a monthly basis, and
    • Within 30 days of month-end

Historical data availability

  • Availability of historical data varies considerably.
  • Some municipalities reported having data dating back to 2019 or earlier
  • Others could only provide:
    • The most recent year, or
    • No historical data at all

Availability of key data elements

  • Core data elements are widely available across municipalities.
  • Most respondents indicated they could provide data on:
    • Residential structure type
    • Permit type or category
    • Location data (address and/or coordinates)
    • Permit identifiers
    • Additional project characteristics, where available
  • These elements align well with the RBO project's proposed reporting structure.

Common challenges and barriers

  • Respondents identified similar challenges across regions, including:
    • Limited staffing and resources
    • Timeliness and processing delays
    • Data quality or completeness issues
    • Technical or system limitations
    • Lack of centralized data

Data sharing and open data

  • Most municipalities do not have an open data portal:
    • Approximately 86% reported having no public open data portal, although some share data through requests or secure transfers.
  • Over half of respondents already share housing-related data with another government organization, suggesting opportunities to leverage existing data-sharing agreements and minimize duplicate reporting.

Next steps

Based on the feedback summarized above, Statistics Canada will:

  • Use this feedback to refine the RBO data collection strategy, including prioritizing fields that municipalities can readily provide.
  • Continue collaborating with provinces, territories, and municipalities to align workflows and definitions.
  • Explore administrative data integration and technological solutions (e.g., Application Programming Interfaces (APIs), automated extracts) to minimize reporting burden.
  • Prepare recommendations for phased implementation reflecting municipal capacity.
  • Share progress updates through future engagement activities.

Thank you

Statistics Canada thanks all participating municipalities for their time and contributions. Their insights are essential to improving the availability, quality, and relevance of housing data in Canada.

For questions about this engagement, please contact: consultativeengagement mobilisationconsultative@statcan.gc.ca
 

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