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Finish the Sixplex Permission

Amar Varma

Amar Varma

August 10, 2026

All Toronto Memos

Finish the Sixplex Permission

Amar Varma

Amar Varma

August 10, 2026

Key Messages
01

Toronto legalized sixplexes in June 2025 but only in 9 of its 25 wards, leaving most of the city unable to build one of its most needed and least supplied housing types as-of-right.

02

The unfinished reform has a concrete price: CMHC found the City non-compliant with its $471-million Housing Accelerator Fund agreement and cut $10 million in January 2026, with the remaining payments still conditional.

03

The City should finish the job — extend Official Plan Amendment 818 to all 25 wards on one citywide technical standard and formally pursue restoration of the withheld funding with CMHC.

Extend as-of-right sixplex zoning from nine wards to 25, on one citywide standard — and recover the $10 million in federal housing funding withheld while the reform sits unfinished.

Summary

Toronto legalized sixplexes in June 2025 but only in 9 of its 25 wards. Council received a staff-drafted citywide permission and cut it back to Toronto and East York plus Scarborough North, leaving sixteen wards to opt in one Councillor letter at a time 1.

Sixplexes are exactly the housing type that Toronto needs to make a significant difference in one of the least supplied and most desired housing types. Even more than that the unfinished permission now has a concrete price: CMHC found the City non-compliant with its $471-million Housing Accelerator Fund agreement and reduced it by $10 million in January 2026, with the remaining payments still conditional 2,3,5. The minister’s letter indicated funding could be restored if more wards were included 7.

The City should finish the job: bring the citywide extension of Official Plan Amendment 818 to the new Council’s first Planning and Housing Committee cycle, write it to one technical standard, and formally pursue restoration with CMHC.

The Recommendation

Toronto should complete the sixplex reform by extending the Official Plan Amendment 818 and its companion zoning by-law amendment from nine wards to all 25, on a single set of technical standards, and put the City back in line with its federal housing agreement. City Hall has complete authority to amend the Official Plan and Zoning By-law 569-2013 and the report Council considered in June 2025 already recommended a citywide permission 1.

Toronto expects at least 830,000 new residents by 2051 1, but it is currently building less housing rather than more. 2025 housing starts in the Toronto region ran at the lowest per-capita level among Canada’s seven largest metropolitan areas 13. The Neighbourhoods that represent just under 80 per cent of the city’s residential land contribute almost none of the starts that do happen. From 2011 to 2023 they generated only 15,911 building permits that proposed new units, but two of every three of these replaced one house with another, so only 6,088 net new homes were built in thirteen years — fewer than 470 a year 14. As a result some Neighbourhoods are losing population not only locking out new residents but limiting the support for the local retail, schools and services that have already been built there 1. The sixplex is the exact housing type that could resolve this with family-sized housing, rents and sale values that are often below comparable apartments and well below larger single-family homes,

Updating these permissions would let homeowners and small builders decide lot-by-lot whether six units are worth building. By creating one citywide standard rather than ward-by-ward variants the City will be able to simplify permissions and increase the speed and scale of development.

Edmonton shows that city wide rules work. It replaced its old zoning with one citywide bylaw and one citywide rezoning, in force January 1, 2024, allowing up to eight units on mid-block lots 8,9; the city’s one-year review counted 16,511 dwelling units approved in 2024, up 30 per cent from 2023, with row housing in its established, redeveloping areas running at roughly four times the level of each of the five prior years 9.

The Problem

Today nearly all of Etobicoke, York, North York and Scarborough remain unable to build sixplexes, locking out homeowners and small builders from responding to market demands. In these wards, a six-unit building on a residential lot still needs a rezoning or minor variances: months of process and increased carrying cost for a building type that is legal as-of-right in the rest of the city.

The Official Plan Amendment 818 and the companion amendment to Zoning By-law 569-2013, adopted June 2, 2025, permitted sixplexes — low-rise buildings of up to six units — in the neighbourhoods of eight Toronto and East York wards plus Ward 23 1. This limited reach was the result of an opt-in mechanism that allows a Councillor to request extension by correspondence to the Chief Planner, who reports to committee “as needed” 1. As of July 8, 2026, no extension amendment has come forward 1.

The City’s $471-million Housing Accelerator Fund agreement commits Toronto to eight initiatives, including expanded missing-middle permissions; the sixplex study was undertaken as part of that application 3,4. In March 2025 the then federal housing minister warned, as reported, that stopping short of citywide would cost 25 per cent of the City’s roughly $118-million annual payment — almost $30 million 6. On January 16, 2026, CMHC formally found Toronto non-compliant and reduced the agreement by $10 million, split across the two remaining 2026 payments, with withheld funds offered to top-performing HAF communities 2,5. The minister’s letter named the nine-ward decision as the shortfall and indicated funding could be restored if more wards opt in 5,7.

The four-unit experience shows that the missing wards are being denied access to building a housing type that is in serious demand. Citywide multiplex permissions produced roughly 750 applications and 452 building permits in their first eighteen months, about three-quarters of them conversions of existing houses 10. The current map responds to political positioning not housing need, lot size or transit access.

Implementation

Complete the permission citywide. City Council should direct the Chief Planner and Executive Director, City Planning, in consultation with the City Solicitor, to bring forward the Official Plan and Zoning By-law amendments extending the sixplex permission to all 25 wards, drafted to fit the provincial official-plan standardization under Bill 98 (royal assent June 2, 2026) 12. In the interim, continue processing ward additions under the decision’s existing correspondence mechanism, so willing wards need not wait 1.

Write one standard, not twenty-five. City Council should direct the Chief Planner and Executive Director, City Planning, together with the Chief Building Official and Executive Director, Toronto Building, to carry the extension on a single citywide set of technical standards — height, lot metrics, parking — harmonized with the existing multiplex framework, so a sixplex that is legal in Etobicoke is legal on the same terms in Scarborough. The permission already runs on two prototype templates, the Ward 23 study’s 10-metre form and the sixplex study’s 10.5-metre form 1.

Recover the withheld $10 million. City Council should direct the Executive Director, Housing Secretariat, in consultation with the Chief Planner and the Chief Financial Officer and Treasurer, to report Toronto’s Housing Accelerator Fund compliance position to the Executive Committee within one cycle of the citywide amendment’s adoption, and to formally engage CMHC on restoring the $10-million reduction and protecting the remaining milestone payments 2,5. The minister’s letter, as reported, indicated restoration is possible as more wards permit sixplexes 7; that signal is an offer with a shelf life, since the remaining payments run on the current agreement’s clock 5. The report should also state plainly what each remaining milestone requires and by when, so Council is not surprised by the next compliance finding.

Risks and objections. The strongest objection is local choice: the sixteen wards, through their Councillors, declined this permission a year ago, and a citywide extension overrides that, raising concerns about parking, servicing and neighbourhood character. However, it is clear that these restrictions do not universally reflect the desires of homeowners. Eighteen months of citywide fourplexes produced 452 permits, mostly conversions 10. These kinds of multiplexes create block-scale change that is absorbed gradually. The gain is spread across renters, multigenerational households and small builders citywide; the cost is concentrated, visible and monitored.

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