鈥淪upply!鈥� they scream. 鈥淕ive us housing supply! Only supply can quench the fires of this booming market, only supply can finally douse the raging inferno of ever-increasing home prices.鈥�

You hear these cries loudest from the developers, of course, often while they claim just as loudly that it is only politicians who are holding them back from simply building us out of this mess.

Not so fast.

First off, let me admit that, all other things being equal, boosting the housing supply dramatically would bring down prices. If we could magically create 200,000 or 300,000 extra units of housing overnight, nicely divided between condos, rentals, single family housing, and affordable and seniors housing, yeah, that would have an impact.

And yes, there are things that various municipal governments could do to free up more land for development 鈥� and that鈥檚 without touching the ALR.

But (and you knew there would be a 鈥渂ut鈥�) actually adding that much supply is more complicated than that.

First of all, we don鈥檛 actually know how much demand is really out there.

We know how much money people are willing to put down for a condo or a house, sure. But we still have no idea how many people buying pre-sale condos actually intend to live in them, and .

We don鈥檛 know how much money looking for somewhere to launder their money 鈥� but we know millions of dirty dollars were looking for somewhere to hide.

We don鈥檛 even know how many of those speculators and crooks have been as investments, but we know there are definitely some homes that have never been lived in, or are empty as they are flipped over and over for years.

But for now, let鈥檚 ignore all of that. Dump enough supply, and we can swamp the speculators, forcing them to sell or rent their houses, right?

Okay, but how, exactly, are we going to add even more supply? Who鈥檚 going to build all these houses?

B.C. currently has the lowest unemployment rate in the country, at 4.8 per cent. The unemployment rate in the southwest region, which includes Metro Vancouver, is even lower at 4.4 per cent. Drive around and you鈥檒l still see signs in fast food restaurant windows and retail stores screaming HELP WANTED. It鈥檚 hard to find people to wash dishes, sell clothes, wait tables, or do anything on the low-wage end of the scale.

That鈥檚 a good thing, but it means we have a labour crunch.

A year ago, when the 91原创 Advance did its Housing Crunch series, developers told us there were already shortages in some skilled trades. Slashing red tape at city halls won鈥檛 do anything to fix that.

We鈥檝e seen wages rising everywhere, and construction is no exception. The average wage in B.C. for construction workers is $29.18 an hour as of May, and it鈥檚 been going up.

Assuming we could actually rev up the real estate market even more, where would we get the skilled trades from, exactly? And assuming that we can lure them away from the rest of Canada or even from abroad, how much are we going to have to pay them, and how much would that add to the price of a home?

How about the question of whether or not we鈥檙e building enough homes now?

According to Metro Vancouver, last year 21,806 housing units were completed. That鈥檚 a lot, a big increase over both the five-year construction average (18,685) and the 10-year average (17,571).

The 91原创s did their part, adding 1,880 housing units. With an average occupancy rate of 2.8 people per dwelling, that鈥檚 room for about 5,264 people in the 91原创s last year. The Canadian average is 2.4 people per dwelling, so we added space for approximately 52,000 people to Metro Vancouver.

Is that enough housing?

Well, it should be, according to the Real Estate Board of Greater Vancouver. A few years back, in the Lower Mainland each year. So we should be okay!

Well, 2017 was a good year for building. In 2016, we built just 18,148 housing units in Metro.

That adds up to room for more than 43,000 people.

These are, admittedly, back of the envelope calculations. But the core numbers are real. We are building a lot of homes already. If we鈥檙e building the wrong kind, maybe industry would like to take a look at its practices?

Supply? We鈥檝e got a fair bit. We could get more, but it would be costly.

Unfortunately, I think the only thing to do now is to wait. Either there really is a lot of organic demand for housing, and a dire lack of supply, or there isn鈥檛.

We鈥檒l find out which, soon enough.