[homeles_ot-l] Bad news for renter households FW: [nhhn-can] Wellesley update

[Lynne Browne]

FYI, the Alliance will be sending out a media release shortly.

Lynne Browne 
Coordinator, Alliance to End Homelessness 
147 Besserer Street, Ottawa ON  K1N 6A7 
613-241-7913 x 205, lbrowne at ysb.on.ca 
www.endhomelessnessottawa.ca 

   _____  

From: Michael Shapcott [mailto:Michael at wellesleyinstitute.com] 
Sent: June 6, 2007 2:44 PM
To: hhno-on at povnet.org; nhhn-can at povnet.org
Subject: [nhhn-can] Wellesley update: Bad news for renter households

 

Canada’s four million renter households woke up to more bad news this
morning as the latest survey from Canada Mortgage and Housing Corporation
shows that the country’s already dangerously low rental vacancy rate has
slipped even lower. 

 

There’s more bad news: The CMHC survey reveals that over the past year,
rents have increased faster than the rate of inflation and also that there
is no relief in the so-called secondary rental market (rented condos), where
the vacancy rate and average rents are even worse than in the conventional
private rental market.

 

The CMHC rental market survey, which is being released twice-annually
starting with today’s publication, is considered a leading indicator of the
relative health of the private rental market, where most low, moderate and
middle-income Canadians live. 

 

A lower vacancy rate means fewer apartments are available. CMHC reports that
the number of vacant apartments across Canada dropped from about 51,000 in
2005 to 48,000 in 2006. Higher rents makes it more difficult for low,
moderate and middle-income households to pay the rent, plus cover the cost
of energy, food, medicine, transportation and other necessities. 

 

The need for affordable homes is growing across Canada due to immigration
(most immigrants arrive in Canada poorer than resident Canadians, and they
remain poorer for longer) and persistent poverty. 

 

Governments at the federal level, and in many provinces, cut billions of
dollars from affordable housing programs in the 1980s and 1990s, hoping that
the private rental market would supply the homes that are so desperately
needed. But the private market is failing in almost every part of Canada -
including the booming cities of Alberta, where a robust private economy is
supposed to “lift all boats”.

 

Canada is one of the few developed countries in the world without a
comprehensive and fully-funded national housing program. The latest rental
market numbers show that there will be no miracle in the private sector to
provide housing for low income Canadians. It points to the urgent need to
move from the current inadequately-funded patchwork of federal, provincial
and municipal initiatives to a truly comprehensive and properly-funded
program.

 

The CMHC numbers don’t measure the relative housing needs of Canadians, but
simply record averages in the private rental market. In December of 2006,
CMHC reported that one million renter households and half a million owner
households were in core housing need - a key measure of the country’s
affordable housing crisis. 

 

Full details on the latest CMHC numbers are available at:

HYPERLINK
"http://www.cmhc-schl.gc.ca/en/corp/nero/nere/2007/2007-06-06-0815.cfm"http:
//www.cmhc-schl.gc.ca/en/corp/nero/nere/2007/2007-06-06-0815.cfm

 

- Michael Shapcott, Senior Fellow

The Wellesley Institute

 

 

* * *

 

Michael Shapcott, Senior Fellow

The Wellesley Institute

45 Charles Street East, #101

Toronto, ON., Canada M4Y 1S2

Tel. - 416-972-1010, x231

Mobile - 416-605-8316

Fax - 416-921-7228

www.wellesleyinstitute.com

 


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