The Nova Scotia Provincial Housing Agency (NSPHA) is a Crown corporation dedicated to providing deeply affordable housing to low-income Nova Scotians. As the largest social housing provider in the province, we operate and maintain more than 12,400 public housing units in a variety of building styles, from single-family homes to high-rise apartment buildings. We proudly house over 20,000 Nova Scotians.
This page provides a snapshot of public housing in Nova Scotia including key data related to applicants, vacancy rate, wait times and tenants as of March 31, 2026. Data is updated annually.
Who We Serve
NSPHA manages over 12,400 public housing units across Nova Scotia.
There are over 20,000 Nova Scotians living with NSPHA. By client type: 6% of households are individuals and couples under the age of 58; 25% are families (at least one adult and one dependent); and 69% are seniors (58 years of age or older).
Households by District
32% of households are in the Metro district, 28% are in Cape Breton, 21% are in the Western district and 19% are in the Northern district.
Vacancy Rate
2.9% Vacancy Rate as of March 2026 compared to 5.2% Vacancy Rate December 2022.
The vacancy rate is the percentage of all units in the public housing portfolio that are unoccupied. When NSPHA was established in December 2022, the vacancy rate was 5.2%. Since then, efforts to reduce vacancies have kept the rate consistently below 3%. As of March 31, 2026, the vacancy rate is 2.9%, this includes all vacant units that are offline for reasons including fire or severe damage.
Demand for Public Housing
NSPHA is focused on housing as many Nova Scotians as possible by reducing vacancy rates and improving unit turnaround times.
To help address this, the Province is working with federal partners, municipalities, and private and community housing providers to increase the supply of affordable housing. This includes a historic $251 million investment to build 515 new public housing units across Nova Scotia - the largest investment in public housing in 30 years. Once complete, these homes will provide deeply affordable, rent-geared-to-income (RGI) housing for more than 1,300 Nova Scotians.
Status updates on new public housing projects are available here: https://housing.buildns.ca/
The public housing waitlist reflects a point in time and can fluctuate due to factors such as population growth, housing market conditions, affordability challenges and the evolving needs of an aging population. Encouragingly, the average wait time for current applicants is approximately 1.7 years, down from 2.3 years in 2022 and unchanged from 2025. For priority access applicants waitlist times have been reduced by 52% since 2022.
Waitlist Applicants by District:
Wait times for applicants can vary depending on where they want to live, the type of property they choose, priority status and housing needs. The best way for an applicant to understand how long it will take to be housed is to contact their local NSPHA office.
| District | % | Avg. Time on Waitlist* |
|---|---|---|
| Metro | 43 | 1.8 years |
| Cape Breton | 15 | 1.3 years |
| Northern | 22 | 1.9 years |
| Western | 20 | 1.5 years |
| Province Wide | 100 | 1.7 years |
Priority Access
NSPHA provides priority access to public housing for Nova Scotians in urgent situations. This ensures that those most in need are matched to homes as quickly as possible.
Households in the following circumstances are given priority access:
- experiencing homelessness,
- fleeing or experiencing gender-based violence,
- living in inadequate housing, and;
- requiring housing near life sustaining health services.
The average time current Priority Access applicants have spent on the waitlist is about 11 months, down 52% since 2022 when the average wait time was 2 years.
For more information on priority access, click here.