A little more than a year ago, Prime Minister Mark Carney stood in Ottawa in front of a backdrop of partly constructed, prefabricated houses to announce the launch of Build Canada Homes, the federal government's initiative to tackle the housing crisis and speed up residential construction.

The agency promises to scale up the delivery of affordable housing at a time when industry leaders are raising the alarm about the lagging pace of housing development across the country.

So far, Build Canada Homes has committed to supporting the construction of roughly 19,000 affordable units across the country — only about 2,000 of these are currently being built.

"I think we can always go faster," Dave Wilkes, president and CEO of the Building Industry and Land Development Association based in Toronto, said in an interview. "I like to say I work for an industry that measures patience in terms of seconds."

To be fair, the federal housing agency did only become a Crown corporation in July, shortly after the Build Canada Homes Act received royal assent. A large portion of the past year has been spent clearing bureaucratic hurdles, securing land transfers and signing intergovernmental deals.