Secure Your Space. Stabilize Your Business.
Sign the Petition: Increase CSBFP Property Loans to $5M
Why do Business Owners Need Help Buying a Property?
Your landlord just hit you with a 40% rent increase at renewal. You looked into buying the building, but even with good credit and 15 years in business, the banks said no because you don’t have the 40-50% down-payment.
Local businesses are being systematically displaced from the neighborhoods they helped build across Canada. Without a path to ownership, even successful businesses with decades of history can’t escape rent volatility. One lease renewal can end a long-standing business.
The Canada Small Business Financing Program was designed to help businesses buy property and achieve stability. But it hasn’t kept pace: between 2019-2024, fewer than 6,000 Canadian businesses used CSBFP to buy their buildings – just 23% of all program loans. The $1M maximum sits far below actual property costs, leaving business owners trapped between rising rents they can’t sustain and ownership they can’t reach.
Businesses need this program to provide what the rental market no longer offers: predictability and long-term stability.
What is the Canada Small Business Financing Program?
The Canada Small Business Financing Program (CSBFP) is a federal loan guarantee program that helps small businesses access financing from banks and credit unions. When a business can’t get a conventional loan, the CSBFP reduces the lender’s risk by guaranteeing up to 85% of the loan.
The program was designed to help small businesses:
- Buy equipment and machinery
- Make leasehold improvements
- Purchase commercial property
Here’s the problem: The $1M maximum loan hasn’t kept pace with commercial property costs. On top of that, the program charges a 2% registration fee and interest rates sit around 11-13%.
Even businesses that qualify aren’t satisfied: According to the government’s own 2024 evaluation, only 55% of CSBFP borrowers found the program’s terms reasonable. Just 39% thought the 2% registration fee was fair.
What we’re hearing from business owners: Many have successfully qualified for CSBFP financing, but because the $1M maximum falls short of property costs, they’re forced to blend it with other, riskier forms of financing just to close the deal. This defeats the purpose of having a government-backed program – it should make ownership more accessible, not add layers of financial complexity and risk.
Increasing the maximum would allow the program to work as intended: giving businesses a clear, stable path to ownership.
The Solution
Help small business owners secure their spaces through ownership. By modernizing the Canada Small Business Financing Program (CSBFP):
1. Increase the maximum loan to $5M – enabling property ownership that reflects current market conditions
2. Reduce fees and interest margins – making ownership actually affordable:
- Lower the registration fee from 2% to 0.5%
- Encourage lenders to target interest rates between 6-7.5% instead of 11-13%
- Reduce the required down-payment amount to a maximum of 15-20%
Why this matters: Even if you qualify for the current CSBFP, high fees and interest rates (currently prime + 3% plus a 2% registration fee) make ownership financially risky. Lowering costs makes the difference between ownership being a pipe dream and a viable business decision.
Businesses that own their buildings achieve:
- Predictable occupancy costs – freeing them from rent volatility
- Long-term stability – protecting them from displacement and helping them invest in strengthening their workforce and innovation
- Generational wealth building – keeping businesses and property ownership in Canadian hands
Local ownership keeps more wealth within communities – improving the stability of neighborhoods and protecting main streets from speculative real estate pressures.
Secure Your Space FAQ
Can't business owners already buy their property?
Business owners, especially retailers and restaurateurs, often don’t qualify for mortgages – even if they’ve had many years of great success. Businesses have higher down payment and eligibility requirements than residential property buyers.
Traditional commercial mortgages require 30-40% down payments that most small businesses don’t have. The current CSBFP maximum of $1M doesn’t reflect real property costs in most markets – and wasn’t designed for property acquisition. We need financing that reflects actual market conditions.
How does this help business stability?
Ownership eliminates the single biggest threat to small business survival: unpredictable rent increases. Data shows commercial rent jumped 142% in Toronto between 2019-2024 – and in many urban, suburban and rural parts of Canada, similar increases are common. Businesses that own their buildings have stable, predictable occupancy costs. They can’t be displaced by landlords or priced out at lease renewal.
What makes this different from the current CSBFP?
Three key changes:
- Raise the maximum loan to $5M – reflecting actual commercial property prices
- Lower the registration fee from 2% to 0.5% – reducing upfront costs
- Reduce interest margins – targeting rates around 7% instead of 9.5%
The current program’s $1M maximum and high costs (prime + 3% interest plus 2% fee) made sense when the program was designed, but property costs and borrowing costs have created impossible barriers. These updates bring the program in line with market readiness and make ownership financially viable for business owners.
What's the economic impact?
When businesses own their buildings:
- They invest more in improvements (they own the asset)
- They stay longer (building community relationships)
- They employ more consistently (no displacement risk)
- Their wealth stays in Canada (not flowing to offshore property owners)
Multiply this across thousands of businesses and you’re talking about billions in economic stability and local wealth building across Canadian communities.
Isn't this just helping wealthy property investors?
No. This is specifically designed for operating businesses buying their own locations – not investors or developers. The business must occupy and operate from the property. This keeps commercial spaces in the hands of the businesses that use them, protecting main streets from speculative investors who maximize rents without regard for business viability.
Won't this drive up commercial property prices?
More local business buyers competing with speculative investors actually creates downward pressure on prices. Investors can pay more because they’re optimizing for maximum rents. Owner-operators need properties that work for their business economics – they’re natural market stabilizers. More importantly, every business that buys is one fewer tenant exposed to rent extraction.
This helps businesses that rent, too. When more businesses can buy their buildings, it reduces demand pressure on rental properties, creates more stable commercial corridors, and demonstrates that alternatives to unpredictable rent exist. Even if you choose to keep renting, a healthier commercial real estate ecosystem with more owner-operators helps everyone and builds political will for other commercial rent protections.
Can't we just protect businesses from big rent hikes?
That would be nice! Unlike many residential renters, commercial rent can go up by any amount during a lease renewal – or in some cases right in the middle of a lease.
Predictable Rent Increases is an idea we support in our Commercial Renter Bill of Rights. Not every business wants to purchase their property which is why we created the Bill of Rights – to ensure there are guidelines for better deals between landlords and tenants.
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