Renters feeling the squeeze of the local real estate market
Posted October 25, 2016 7:15 am.
This article is more than 5 years old.
VANCOUVER (NEWS 1130) – One of the side effects of so many multi-million dollar properties in Vancouver is even the well-off middle class are feeling the rental crisis. Last night, a rental housing town hall was held in Point Grey and it was packed.
One woman we spoke to, who didn’t want her name published, says is dishing out $4,500 a month in rent to live in a Kitsilano house she loves, but she can’t afford her own. “I’m actually living in the city, paying a huge amount of rent and not feeling supported.”
She adds landlords in the past have been untrustworthy and difficult and there aren’t a lot of options. “We must have looked at 40 homes before we found the one that we took and some of them were $4,000 tear-down shacks — embarrassing, I don’t even know how people could rent them,” she adds.
Other renters told NEWS 1130 they’ve increasingly thought about moving out of the city to a place where they could afford a home. “I think it impacts everybody, even if you aren’t a renter, because who’s going to be able to live in the city pretty soon?” adds another woman.
The town hall was put on by NDP MLA David Eby who says many homes in Vancouver’s West Side used to have rental space, but those have rapidly disappeared.
.@Dave_Eby says in #Vancouver #pointgrey houses with suites or rental options are being torn down and replaced with something different pic.twitter.com/OBnqo5inN5
— Stephanie Froese (@StephanieFroese) October 25, 2016
Property assessments show about 19 per cent of single-family homes were over a $1 million in 2006, as opposed to an estimated 91 per cent right now.
