More tradespeople needed for P.E.I. home builders to expand

Construction season is underway for P.E.I. home building companies and they are asking for more available qualified workers for their industry to grow to meet the demand.

'It creates a lot of challenges for us, finding good carpenters at the moment is an issue'

Jane Robertson · CBC News · Posted: Jun 01, 2018 5:00 AM EDT | Last Updated: June 1, 2018

Construction worker — Workers building homes on Prince Edward Island are putting in long hours during the summer construction season to meet the Island's housing demand. (Jane Robertson/CBC)

The sounds of air-powered nail guns ring out across Charlottetown as the home building construction season kicks into high gear.

Some Island companies get build orders and then work to meet the area's growing demand.

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"We have been hearing quite a bit that the used home market is getting fairly low, there is not a whole lot out there," said Joel Leger, president of Premier Island Homes.

"We have had a lot of traffic with people that would typically prefer buying new and they are choosing the option to build just because of the lack of homes."

Joel Leger, general manager with Premier Island Homes, has seen the demand increase by 40 per cent year over year since 2013. (Jane Robertson/CBC)

Leger said that demand in the area has impacted his business.

"We've been increasing by about 40 percent year over year," Leger said.

The custom home builder started on the Island in 2013 as a franchise of Canadian company Supreme Homes.

Challenged to find more workers

They currently have multiple home building projects on the go but have reached a working limit with the amount of jobs they can take on.

"It creates a lot of challenges for us, finding good carpenters at the moment is an issue," Leger said.

"We've done fairly well on hitting our deadlines, it typically means that myself and some of the key guys on the crew have to work extra-long weeks, sometimes up to 80 hours a week."

A house under construction — Leger hopes the government can put incentives in place to bring more experienced carpenters to the Island. (Jane Robertson/CBC)

Leger said the news that the provincial government is considering a rebate would be helpful to get more people into a home. He said more workers would also help get more homes built.

"We would love to have more workers from Alberta coming back to P.E.I., carpenters are a huge priority," Leger said.

"If the government could get some sort of a [incentives] program ... for workers to come back, that would be great."