Time To Oust The Tories: Rent Control Not Coming

[Azure]

Well if we know what the rate of inflation is, why not control the rent so that it is never raised at a higher rate per year than what the rate of inflation is?

3% inflation....rent only goes up by 3%....which is only reasonable.

Or do you stay away from something like that too in a free market economy?

I mean if the landlords know what the market will bear, they'll adjust accordingly. People will stay pay rent, even if it rises 500 bucks per year. Or however much it does. Especially in Calgary.

[photon]

That would be fine if everything else went up only at inflation, like property values, cost of trades, borrowing costs, etc... But all those things are highly variable.

[Azure]

Originally Posted by photon

That would be fine if everything else went up only at inflation, like property values, cost of trades, borrowing costs, etc... But all those things are highly variable.

Wages...

I understand what you're saying.

I do agree that it wouldn't work to fix the rent.....but you have thousands of students getting out of University each year....and they're supposed to pay such astronomical rates?

[Shawnski]

I got caught in the Villa Blanca kickout for low income housing F-up, where I had awesome landlords who didn't raise my rent in the five years I was there. However, the city decided to buy that block and make it low income housing, thereby putting 80+ people/families out into the market. Rough time, and I vocalized it here. If rent controls came in, this would be more often the case, with apartments going condo. Don't fool yourself Nehkara. What you seek isn't logical.

Originally Posted by JiriHrdina

No reason not to make it permanent.

On the contrary Grant, I have benefitted from this.. big time (I got lucky). $475 for a good sized suite with all amenities. And rents aren't going up this year either (again, good landlords, and I am a good renter.)

If you relax the laws, then the owners can raise rents similarily to everything else. For those renters that want a buy, find those mother-in-law suites that are not legit. At this time, it is the best buy out there.

[Flames in 07]

Originally Posted by Nehkara

Lost money? I have a hard time believing that. Maybe they only just broke even, but I doubt they lost money.

Now they are probably mostly making a fortune off of people who now struggle to get by.

It's not right, sorry. Needs to be fixed.

Don't worry about moving South. Move East about 2 or 3 timezones.

If it is government managed markets you seek, going to the US won't be the best solution.

You need to understand, the long term result of rent control is less rental units. You say yourself that workers can't find a place. Well, I repeat (I actually cut and paste) the long term result of rent control is less rental units.

Government bandaids are rarely the solution. Yes Calgary does need affordable housing, but the government managing the rental business is nota solution, in the long run it will make the problem worse. Many people who have rental property will convert to condos or simply sell the property away. To me the best solution is to relax the restrictions on illegal basement units.

BTW I can tell you are about 27 or younger, if you can't imagine homeowners leaking money because rent is too low.

You have to look at every perspective when you consider economic policy, and rent control makes sense for a portion of the population, but is counterproductive towards long term goals.

[Dion]

A group of angry tenants held an emergency meeting with a pair of government ministers Tuesday to plead for help with their rapidly rising rental rates.

"I lie awake at night because I'm terrified of losing my apartment," Giancarlo Grande told Housing Minister Ray Danyluk and Service Alberta Minister Lloyd Snelgrove.

Grande, 38, has a spinal condition that has left him bent over and unable to work. His rent increase this year has been modest $50 a month, but as an AISH recipient he figures he's not far from eviction.

"As a man, I don't like to beg. But when you have a disability sometimes you end up doing it," Carlo said. "I shall not beg anymore. I want an affordable place now and in the future."

http://www.canada.com/edmontonjourna...f1ba83&k=21026

[Dion]

Originally Posted by Nehkara

Lost money? I have a hard time believing that. Maybe they only just broke even, but I doubt they lost money.

Now they are probably mostly making a fortune off of people who now struggle to get by.

It's not right, sorry. Needs to be fixed.

It wasn't that long ago that apartments sat empty as landlords couldn't find tenants for them. Owners have mortagages, taxes, and basic maintinence and upgrades to pay for and those empty suites were negatively affecting their bottom line. Rents were relativley cheap and it was a renters market.

Now we have the reverse and it's a landlords market. Some, not all, are using this as a means to gouge renters. Others are merely trying to get rents in line with the rising costs of maintaining a rental property. Just like homeowners, their property taxes and utilities go up too. It's not unreasonable for landlords to try and gets rents in line with those increases.

That said we have a section of the population that is being negatively affected by these increases. And from what i'm hearing and reading in the media it's becoming a crisis that I believe the Stelmach govt is failing to deal with. I will agree with you that something needs to be done to help these people. My fear is that if Stelmach govt does a reversal on rent controls more landlords will unilateraly decide to sell their proprties or convert them to condos, thus putting low income earners in a more dire situation. Outside of moving to another province i'm not sure what the solution is.

[BlackArcher101]

What classifies a low income earner theses days?

[RedHot25]

Originally Posted by BlackArcher101

What classifies a low income earner theses days?

Well, whose numbers do you want?

There is much debate over how you classify 'low income', 'poverty line', etc etc. There is everything from LICO (low income cut off), to the market basket measure, etc etc...

[simmer2]

Originally Posted by Dion

http://www.canada.com/edmontonjourna...f1ba83&k=21026

The government is in between a rock and a hard place on this issue. There are pensioners and retirees out there who see there pension increase with inflation, but of course inflation does not take into account housing costs. Rents will undoubtedly increase as housing costs and inflation go up, to the point where some tenants won't be able to afford it. Some social program needs to be put in place to help those retirees or pensioners afford a place to live. Nobody wants to see Alberta become a place where we kick out our pensioners.

Rent control is the solution that has been proposed to keep some of these spiraling rise in costs in check. There are fundamentally some large problems with rent control. Right now you are already seeing the effects of rent control in that investment property owners are raising the price on rents because they are afraid rent control will limit them to 3 or 4% per year. They don't want to get behind the eight ball so they raise it by a couple hundred before the legislation comes into effect.

As well, new investors wanting to purchase homes will not buy new homes because they will not get the return they are looking for, thereby effectively reducing the number of new rental properties available in the city.

Even current landlords may sell their homes before raising the price in rent because they don't want to be the bad guy. They sell their property to a family to live there and just like that another rental property is off the market.

The best solution would be to make secondary suites legal and see how that plays out over the next year. This would open up a number of potential rental suites available and would undoubtedly help the market.

[Incinerator]

Originally Posted by BlackArcher101

What classifies a low income earner theses days?

In Calgary? I would guess that applies if you are grossing below $35K.

[Cowperson]

"We're not looking for hand-outs, sir, we're looking for solutions," said Peter Tyleman, 55, whose apartment is being turned into luxury condos.

Actually, he is looking for a handout . . . . . because a handout is the only way a person who is non-competitive within the most competitive economic climate in North America can continue to stay in that location.

And that's the issue . . . . non-competitive people who through circumstance or their own doing have put themselves in a position of vulnerability (renters) at a moment in history when they're effectively and rapidly being priced out of the market.

That's not the problem of the property owner and its a monumental cheap shot to talk about "gouging." If the property owner can find renters or buyers at the prices he's asking, then "gouging" isn't the word that should be used.

Last year, I bought a small house in rural Saskatchewan and put a homeless relative into it . . . . . simultaneously removing him from trying to compete in the Calgary job market where he was hopelessly non-competitive (for mental health reasons) and putting him in a place where he had a chance to fend for himself (an experienced farm worker).

I saw no point in giving him handouts, putting him in motels on cold winter days, etc, etc . . . . . simply continuing the cycle seemed like a stupid waste of money.

He's happy and, in a way, he's in subsidized housing.

So, I'd say the chronic housing shortage in Calgary isn't a problem that should be foisted on landlords.

If Calgary companies need workers so bad then they should pay them more so they can afford the current housing or, if that makes the business non-competitive, then the business owner has the option of moving somewhere else as well.

If 82 year-old Aunt Alice can't afford the rent in downtown Edmonton then, too bad, she probably needs to pack up and move to an apartment in Oyen or something.

Or . . . . . the government can make a political decision to subsidize certain people like Aunt Alice at current market rates in downtown Edmonton.

Life sucks if you're one of these non-competitive people (and I saw plenty of them while volunteering at the Calgary Drop-In centre yesterday) but there will always be a certain segment of the population being dislocated to more competitive markets.

Rent controls would simply aggravate the problem. Subsidization at current market rates is a political decision that wouldn't penalize landlords, the burden being shared by society.

Cowperson

[Incinerator]

Originally Posted by simmer2

The best solution would be to make secondary suites legal and see how that plays out over the next year. This would open up a number of potential rental suites available and would undoubtedly help the market.

Even a temporary rent subsidy program would be more preferable than rent control. It's not like Stelmach's government can't afford it, Ralphie left him a boatload of cash that he was going to hand out as another round of Ralph Cheques anyways had he stayed in power for another 3 years.

[Tron_fdc]

Originally Posted by Cowperson

If Calgary companies need workers so bad then they should pay them more so they can afford the current housing or, if that makes the business non-competitive, then the business owner has the option of moving somewhere else as well.

Exactly. With the amount of money in this city, it's entirely feasible for the owners of your local Mcdonalds to raise the price of happy meals by $2, thereby allowing them the flexibility to pay employees more money. Will I care if my McChicken is now $5 and not $3.50? Not at all. It also allows you to attract more employees if you now pay $20/hr to work at 7-11, and allows your employee to at least afford housing.

[Cowboy89]

Originally Posted by Tron_fdc

Exactly. With the amount of money in this city, it's entirely feasible for the owners of your local Mcdonalds to raise the price of happy meals by $2, thereby allowing them the flexibility to pay employees more money. Will I care if my McChicken is now $5 and not $3.50? Not at all. It also allows you to attract more employees if you now pay $20/hr to work at 7-11, and allows your employee to at least afford housing.

It's not like this isn't already happening. Safeway used to pay $6.50 to starting cashiers in 2003 now they pay $10 and rising by the month to compete. That's in a union environment which is even less responsive to change. Other places have definately upped their prices and payed workers more.

What's really happening here is those 'non-competitive' people referred to above by cowperson expect that they don't have to do anything to keep themselves in the exact same housing unit. As in they don't feel they have to look for another higher paying job when their current one no longer pays the bills/ or have to actively find another place to live or work out different living arrangements, or to actually bother to watch their own expenses more carefully. In my experience I've never met someone at the low end of the margin that used what little money they had efficiently either. One of many examples: When I was in High School and worked for Safeway I observed many people trying to buy groceries and smokes at the same time, when the debit card failed to approve they chose to buy the smokes insted of food for their children. These are the same people complaining about the affordability of things in this city. While I agree we have to make an effort to help people who can't help themselves I don't think it's fair to the majority of the population to put up with restrictions and rules to our detrement in order to free up more money for these people to be spent inefficiently.

[burn_baby_burn]

Originally Posted by Cowboy89

It's not like this isn't already happening. Safeway used to pay $6.50 to starting cashiers in 2003 now they pay $10 and rising by the month to compete. That's in a union environment which is even less responsive to change. Other places have definately upped their prices and payed workers more.

What's really happening here is those 'non-competitive' people referred to above by cowperson expect that they don't have to do anything to keep themselves in the exact same housing unit. As in they don't feel they have to look for another higher paying job when their current one no longer pays the bills/ or have to actively find another place to live or work out different living arrangements, or to actually bother to watch their own expenses more carefully. In my experience I've never met someone at the low end of the margin that used what little money they had efficiently either. One of many examples: When I was in High School and worked for Safeway I observed many people trying to buy groceries and smokes at the same time, when the debit card failed to approve they chose to buy the smokes insted of food for their children. These are the same people complaining about the affordability of things in this city. While I agree we have to make an effort to help people who can't help themselves I don't think it's fair to the majority of the population to put up with restrictions and rules to our detrement in order to free up more money for these people to be spent inefficiently.

Just go to a Casino. How many people in there can't afford to be losing money? 80%? Scary.

[Incinerator]

Originally Posted by burn_baby_burn

Just go to a Casino. How many people in there can't afford to be losing money? 80%? Scary.

If you had enough $$ you wouldn't go to a casino everyday to try to win more/try to win what you lost yesterday now would you?

[Teh_Bandwagoner]

Originally Posted by Flames in 07

BTW I can tell you are about 27 or younger, if you can't imagine homeowners leaking money because rent is too low.

I'm 25, and I own a property I bought at the end of last year, which I'm currently renting out.. And yes if rent controls were implemented, depending on how severe, I totally would have let my lease run out, kick my tenants out and just live in it myself. If I have to take a large monetary loss on my place, I'd rather live in it myself.

Back in the 70s, my parents bought a few houses in Calgary to try to rent out. Unfortunately, they got caught in the NEP disaster. Ended up walking away from two mortgages because they couldn't find renters and they couldn't afford the mortgages. Had they been able to keep the houses until now, I'm guessing that they would have only been able to fully recover from those losses in the last year. Yah. Some people hit it lucky by buying a place in 2004. But there were others who were unlucky enough to buy in the late 70s. Again, that's the market for you.

Again, I have to ask why doesn't the government look at subsizing rent, especially for low income families? If Stelmach doesn't at least consider that (which he may have already, I'm not sure), then he'll have dropped the ball IMO.

[Dion]

Originally Posted by BlackArcher101

What classifies a low income earner theses days?

For starters people on disabilities such as AISH and CPP.

[Dion]

Originally Posted by simmer2

The best solution would be to make secondary suites legal and see how that plays out over the next year. This would open up a number of potential rental suites available and would undoubtedly help the market.

The problem with that solution is the NIMBY crowd would cry foul and complain that these suites would drive down their property values. Then there's the parking or lack of problem. Homeowners coming home to find there's no place to park in front of their home because of the 4 tenants in the suite next door.