For brokers and lenders specializing in the realms of commercial and construction financing, the COVID-19 pandemic has thrown up a unique challenge: supply chain snarls that have seen the cost of materials spiral upwards and disrupted the building process across Canada.
The acuteness of the problem is shown in Altus Group’s recently released Canadian Cost Guide 2022, a measure of construction costs across the country, which revealed that 2021 had witnessed a spike in the cost of building compared with the previous year.
Total construction spending in Canada nearly shattered the $300 billion mark last year, the guide said, with the residential side accounting for $126 billion, ICI (industrial, commercial, institutional) totaling $73 billion, and $100 billion shelled out on infrastructure.