Canada’s prefab designs return with a modern spin to speed up builds and ease housing costs.
Prefab and modular home building is in focus once again as Ottawa revives a post-war idea — the CMHC Housing Catalogue — to help mass-supply homes for today’s housing crisis.
With over 3.5 million additional homes needed by 2030 to meet population growth, the ‘Sears catalogue for homes’ is back in vogue under the new Build Canada Homes (BCH) agency.
It combines factory-built technology, ready-made designs, and financing support to make homebuilding faster and more cost-efficient.
The question now is whether this new digital edition of Canada’s housing story can move affordability forward or if it will end up stuck on the pages of red tape and neighbourhood pushback.
Back when homes came out of a catalogue — and cities had plentiful room to grow
After the Second World War, CMHC’s catalogues offered standardized blueprints that builders could use or adapt to local neighbourhoods. Precut materials and prefabricated parts sped up on-site construction and reduced costs.
They’re all around you
Those modest homes, from Victory and Strawberry Box Home styles of the 1940s–60s, to 1970s bungalows and split-levels, helped to house returning military personnel and then middle-class families.
(If you’ve ever heard the argument that Canadian residential architecture is derivative, here’s a good reason why.)
You’ll notice them (or their influence) while out on a neighbourhood walk, or perhaps you even live in one — a reminder that prefab design once worked, quite well, to get more Canadians into homes, faster.
Rendering of a CMHC-prefab Victory Home (late 1940s), which housed returning soldiers from WWII. Later versions, known as Strawberry Box Homes (1950s–1960s), were designed for middle-class families.
Rendering of a 1960s CMHC-prefab raised bungalow or contemporary ranch plan, designed for middle-class families.
Turning the page to density: more homes on less land
The CMHC’s digital catalogue leaves the single-detached home behind for an age of gentle density. With land at a premium, cities are being urged to add more homes within existing neighbourhoods.
The new templates lean on factory precision and efficiencies to quickly deliver ‘missing middle’ housing, such as laneway homes, duplexes, small multiplexes and row housing, that can fit neatly onto existing street lots.
Not for the typical homebuyer — yet
Ottawa’s serious turn in addressing Canada’s housing crunch begins with non-market, deeply affordable community builds on public or surplus land. The goal is to help smaller prefab manufacturers scale and deliver homes faster where they’re needed most.
Fast builds, lower costs, real market potential
According to Ottawa’s Fall 2025 budget release, “prefabricated and modular housing can reduce construction times by up to 50%, costs by up to 20%, and emissions by up to 22% compared to traditional construction methods.”
But those ambitious goals can only be achieved once those smaller companies are running at capacity. Then, that growth can spill over into the private market.
Dan Eisner, founder and CEO of True North Mortgage, agrees: “Most modular builders operate on a small scale. With stronger financing, demand, and regulatory support, production can expand — and that’s when those savings can reach everyday homebuyers.”
As the industry grows, improved design, automation, and cost control could help narrow the gap between promise and price.
Prefab can pre-balance to reduce hot market swings
Housing catalogue designs could again help stabilize home prices and supply as cities and towns absorb young buyers, immigration, and inter-provincial migration.
Everyone has to live somewhere, buying or renting. Increased non-market supply can still translate to fewer bidding wars, steadier equity growth, and calmer price trends overall.
What does prefab need to succeed?
It all seems an ambitious goal, considering that scaling the prefab industry isn’t just about growing demand for these home types, but also about addressing municipal roadblocks, including infrastructure funding (although it appears the federal budget is helping to address these issues).
And, reaching capacity for market impact on housing supply, versus addressing non-market needs, won’t be helped by an economic downturn that some experts predict will result in thousands of jobs lost in the Canadian housing sector.
To make prefab and modular homes work for Canada’s housing woes, three key pieces must fall into place:
- Zoning that allows it — Neighbourhoods need flexibility for gentle-density infill.
- Financing that fits — Normalizing prefab home installation can help developers, lenders, and insurers streamline mortgage approvals to fit prefab timelines.
- Scale that drives prices down — Increased demand and production mean lower costs.
If everything aligns, prefab could once again become a reliable route to ownership, appearing in both established and newer neighbourhoods across our great land — this time built for the realities of today’s market.
Your most affordable mortgage, by design
Canada has addressed a housing shortage with prefab before. But you likely can’t wait for home affordability to improve as a result.
However, you do have access to the best mortgage service in Canada through the salaried experts at True North Mortgage.
With several traditional, alternative, and private lenders at their fingertips, True North puts you first to design a mortgage solution tailored to your specific needs, with a mortgage rate that can help you save thousands on your home, right now.
True North Mortgage is the original architect of lower mortgage rates and better mortgages. Contact Canada’s No.1 Mortgage Broker today — and get help in your preferred language.
