Investment

In 2010, the total building permit value for the Wood Buffalo region stood at a six-year high of $1.5 billion, making up 12.7% of the provincial total.  From 2009 to 2010 the total building permit value for the Wood Buffalo region more than doubled and as of 2010 was 130% above the 2005 level. Much of the increase between 2009 and 2010 is attributable to the commercial permit value rising by 240% to $461 million and industrial permits by 242% to $732 million.  Residential building permits experienced a 19% increase to $243 million in 2010.  Between 2005 and 2010 residential permits increased by 28%.

The total number of dwelling units for which building permits were taken out in the Wood Buffalo region in 2010 was 892.  This was a 6.1% decrease from the previous year and a one-quarter decline from 2005 levels.  All of the decline of the past five years in the number of dwellings can be attributed to a 71% decrease in the number of multiple family dwelling units to 194 units in 2010.  Over the same period the number of single dwellings increased by 35% to 698 units.

In 2010, the number of housing starts1 totaled 769 in the Wood Buffalo Census Agglomeration2, a decline of 29% from 2009’s 1,088 starts.  This decline was the result of a two-thirds drop in multiple family homes; single-detached starts rose 20% between 2009 and 2010.  Housing starts have been on a steady downward path in the region since 2007, when 2,175 units were started.

1 Housing start information is gathered by Canada Mortgage and Housing Commission field offices; building permit estimates are gathered by Statistics Canada from municipalities. A building permit generally precedes the actual start.
2 Census Agglomerations are standard Statistics Canada geographical areas, that consist of one or more adjacent municipalities situated around a major urban core as defined by; the urban core must have a population of at least 10,000. For the Wood Buffalo region most of the housing units are located within the Census Agglomeration.

Date Updated:
RDP-2451