The word ‘Affordable’ is subjective, what seems like a good deal to some is outrageous to others.
So to clear up the debate the city has put some numbers to the word ‘affordable’ in their guidelines for rentals built under a city incentive program:
$1750 for a 1 bedroom apartment
$2505 for a 2 bedroom apartment
Does that match up with your expectations for the term affordable?
Vancouver has approved regulations around short-term rentals and announced fees:
new rules take effect April 1, 2018
owners can rent out part or all of their principal homes; no secondary homes, secondary suites and laneway homes
must pay $49 annual license and one-time $54 activation fee
transaction fee of up to three per cent will be levied by AirBnb and remitted to the city
Read the full article here.
Dude Chillin pointed out this article about a Vancouver strata lawyer preparing a class action suit against Airbnb:
A Vancouver strata lawyer says she is preparing a class action lawsuit against Airbnb, alleging the company is “profiting from the unauthorized use of other people’s property.”
Recently, Polina Furtula — who is on the strata council of her Yaletown condo tower — sent demand letters to Airbnb about unauthorized listings in her building. Airbnb notified the hosts of the complaints and shortly afterwards, the hosts decided to remove their listings.
Read the full article here.
What?
There’s likely more to this story than simple discrimination, but a Vancouver couple is claiming they were denied a housing coop home because their second child was a girl.
Canada Mortgage and Housing Corporation (CMHC) guideline suggests children of opposite sexes can’t share a bedroom if they are over the age of five, but it’s OK for children of the same sex to do so.
Gottfried and Hurtig believe it should be up to parents to decide when and if children share a room.
“I would describe it as being completely outrageous and appalling and just unbelievable,” Gottfried tells Go Public.
“No matter how I thought about it, I couldn’t really wrap my brain around it,” Hurtig says.
The one-income family says money is tight. Getting the unit would have meant their rent would drop from $1,840 to $895 a month.
“It’s discrimination. We get the room if our children are the same sex and we don’t get the room if our children are not the same sex. It’s very, very clear-cut discrimination,” Gottfried said.
Read the full article over at the CBC.
New government, new housing mandate.
In your role as Minister of Municipal Affairs and Housing I expect that you will make substantive progress on the following priorities:
- Partner with local governments and First Nations to develop a community capital infrastructure fund to upgrade and build sports facilities, playgrounds, local community centres, and arts and culture spaces.
- Through partnerships with local governments, the federal govenrment, and the private and not-for- profit sectors, begin to build 114,000 units of affordable market rental, non-profit,
co-op, supported social housing and owner-purchase housing.- Create new student housing by removing unnecessary rules that prevent universities and colleges from building affordable student housing.
- Amend the Residential Tenancy Act to provide stronger protections for renters, and provide additional resources to the Residential Tenancy Branch.
- With the Minister of Finance, deliver an annual renter’s rebate of $400 dollars per rental household to improve rental affordability.
- Work in partnership to develop a homelessness action plan to reduce the homeless population through permanent housing and services. As part of the plan, conduct a province-wide homelessness count.
- Work with the Minister of Finance to address speculation, tax fraud and money laundering in the housing market.
- As the Minister responsible for TransLink, support the Mayors’ Council 10-Year Vision for Metro Vancouver Transportation by funding 40%of the capital costs of every phase of the plan, in partnership with all levels of government.
We suspect many people reading here are disappointed that Eby isn’t the housing minister and are curious to see how that second to last point turns out. You can read the full letter here.