Toronto Carrying Place Vista | 48.46m | 15s | Chamberlain

HousingNowTO · Oct 25, 2021

From that Toronto Star (April 2019) article - "At her former home in Dartmouth, N.S., Stone says she lived comfortably in a two-bedroom apartment, where she paid about $620 in rent each month — a rate she considers affordable."

https://www.thestar.com/news/gta/20...ill-too-pricey-for-seniors-advocate-says.html

Marcia Stone says she is looking for a 40% of AMR rent (~$600/month) to be able to get into that New Build 2-Bedroom unit.

That rent-expectation is unrealistic on these TINY privately-owned sites in Toronto, after planning has already reduced the GFA of the building --- even when the City provides OPEN DOORS supports that this developer qualified for.

We need to create 20-40 Storey buildings with hundreds of units on city-owned (via HOUSING NOW) - to create a handful (3 or 4) of New Build 2-Bedroom unit that can rent for 40% of AMR rent (~$600/month).

These small sites on private land just don't offer the scale to do that --- without some level of government showing-up with ~$370-K per unit in Capital-Subsidy and ~$10,000/unit/year in Annual on-going Subsidy to discount the rent to that level.

Honestly, I would be surprised if her 2-Bedroom apartment back in Dartmouth, NS (*$620/month back in 2016) is renting today for under ~$1,000/month to any new tenant.

Northern Light · Oct 25, 2021

HousingNowTO said:
From that Toronto Star (April 2019) article - "At her former home in Dartmouth, N.S., Stone says she lived comfortably in a two-bedroom apartment, where she paid about $620 in rent each month — a rate she considers affordable."

https://www.thestar.com/news/gta/20...ill-too-pricey-for-seniors-advocate-says.html

Marcia Stone says she is looking for a 40% of AMR rent (~$600/month) to be able to get into that New Build 2-Bedroom unit.

That rent-expectation is unrealistic on these TINY privately-owned sites in Toronto, after planning has already reduced the GFA of the building --- even when the City provides OPEN DOORS supports that this developer qualified for.

We need to create 20-40 Storey buildings with hundreds of units on city-owned (via HOUSING NOW) - to create a handful (3 or 4) of New Build 2-Bedroom unit that can rent for 40% of AMR rent (~$600/month).

These small sites on private land just don't offer the scale to do that --- without some level of government showing-up with ~$370-K per unit in Capital-Subsidy and ~$10,000/unit/year in Annual on-going Subsidy to discount the rent to that level.

Honestly, I would be surprised if her 2-Bedroom apartment back in Dartmouth, NS (*$620/month back in 2016) is renting today for under ~$1,000/month to any new tenant.View attachment 358074

Of course, I agree we need more affordable and deeply affordable housing.

But we we need to consider the income part of the problem as well.

Seattle has a housing market somewhat comparable to our own. It also has a minimum wage of $16.69USD which is $20.65CAD per hour.
Look at that income chart; then consider, that $42,952 per year if paid for a 40 hour work week x 52 weeks.

That certainly isn't enough to help everyone afford Toronto's housing; though in combination with rental supplements, and the National Child Benefit Plan, it would get close for many.

By contrast, the current minimum wage of $14.35 per hour works out to only $29,848 per year, which really in a sad way, laughable in terms of how far that full-time wage is from affording the most entry-level housing in the market.

There will always be people on some form of Social Assistance, Disability Benefit, or Pension for whom the market price in a big city simply will not be obtainable.
For those residents, more housing supply, particularly of the deeply affordable/subsidized rate is crucial. But I think a small, but important part of the issue here is asking the question as to why people working full-time, at greater than the minimum wage cannot afford any market housing. If we can address even a portion of that though boosting incomes, we will better meet the housing challenges of Toronto.

****

I would add, we also need to address the housing market itself; (speculation/flipping etc, but also structural costs due to artificially limited zoning).

Finally, I would add, we can't ignore that at least a portion of the existing housing crunch owes to the large number of foreign students we are bringing in to study here, without having build sufficient housing supply on campus, when they clearly aren't staying with mom and dad!

So we can choose to lower the student numbers.............or, build a great deal more purpose-built student housing, helping to re-set the market in the process.

HousingNowTO · Oct 25, 2021

Northern Light said:
Of course, I agree we need more affordable and deeply affordable housing.

But we we need to consider the income part of the problem as well.

Seattle has a housing market somewhat comparable to our own. It also has a minimum wage of $16.69USD which is $20.65CAD per hour.
Look at that income chart; then consider, that $42,952 per year if paid for a 40 hour work week x 52 weeks.

That certainly isn't enough to help everyone afford Toronto's housing; though in combination with rental supplements, and the National Child Benefit Plan, it would get close for many.

By contrast, the current minimum wage of $14.35 per hour works out to only $29,848 per year, which really in a sad way, laughable in terms of how far that full-time wage is from affording the most entry-level housing in the market.

There will always be people on some form of Social Assistance, Disability Benefit, or Pension for whom the market price in a big city simply will not be obtainable.
For those residents, more housing supply, particularly of the deeply affordable/subsidized rate is crucial. But I think a small, but important part of the issue here is asking the question as to why people working full-time, at greater than the minimum wage cannot afford any market housing. If we can address even a portion of that though boosting incomes, we will better meet the housing challenges of Toronto.

****

I would add, we also need to address the housing market itself; (speculation/flipping etc, but also structural costs due to artificially limited zoning).

Finally, I would add, we can't ignore that at least a portion of the existing housing crunch owes to the large number of foreign students we are bringing in to study here, without having build sufficient housing supply on campus, when they clearly aren't staying with mom and dad!

So we can choose to lower the student numbers.............or, build a great deal more purpose-built student housing, helping to re-set the market in the process.

Yeah, we essentially agree with EVERYTHING stated above --- BUT our focus is on Affordable-Housing development lands... there are lots of other NFP groups working on policy and support for Minimum-Wage, Foreign-Students, etc.

One thing we have suggested is that the Province excludes Colleges and University Campus sites from the local Municipal Planning frameworks - and allows them to develop new housing on-site thru a fast-track MZO like process for new on-campus student-housing. Some of those Campus sites have HUGE parking-lots, etc.

innsertnamehere · Oct 25, 2021

McMaster has been fighting for years to build a new student housing building directly beside its campus along Main Street because the site is currently home to a bunch of single detached dwellings. It would be a huge new housing supply for students but the city has held it up forever.

That's just one example - I'm sure there is lots more.

HousingNowTO · Oct 25, 2021

innsertnamehere said:
McMaster has been fighting for years to build a new student housing building directly beside it's campus along Main Street because the site is currently home to a bunch of single detached dwellings. It would be a huge new housing supply for students but the city has held it up forever.

That's just one example - I'm sure there is lots more.

Yeah, we hear the same kinds of stories about Council/City Planning -vs- Student-Housing (*both On-Campus & Private) all over the province.

https://www.cbc.ca/news/canada/kitchener-waterloo/doon-residents-development-conestoga-student-housing-1.3970496

drum118 · Jan 15, 2022

Jan 14/22
Mods...Need to update the map for a number of project showing black when construction has been underway on them for some time. This still show black after 2 years of construction.

This is one hell of a slow project that started 2 years ago. Haft of the base slab is pour with the base of the tower crane in place. Assuming the rest of the slab will be done once the crane is in place.

interchange42 · Jan 17, 2022

drum118 said:
Jan 14/22
Mods...Need to update the map for a number of project showing black when construction has been underway on them for some time. This still show black after 2 years of construction.

Status changed to under construction, thanks!

Anyone: please let us know if you notice any out-of-date info like the pin colour (or position) needing to be changed on the maps! (Changing the colour is easy, getting the position exact is very difficult with the awful interface we have.)

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