Quote:
Originally Posted by misher
If canada relies on our own population then it will shrink, we are having less babies born then deaths and our population is contracting. You can’t judge our ability to absorb immigrants by looking at Vancouver since canada as a whole and the interior of BC needs immigrants.
1) we have this but we need a lot more I agree.
2) agreed but it’ll never happen!
3) agreed!
4) we don’t have the construction capacity necessary to do this even if we open it up completely. Let’s start this around city centers and skytrain stations? And we can look elsewhere once the main places that need this are done.
5) we already have pretty high transfer taxes and huge capital gains taxes at least 20-40% of the profits are going to tax which is pretty huge?
6) definitely, Vancouver fire code is insanely restrictive as is building codes and somehow you have to spend a ton of time with the landscaping department?
7) many rentals are below market and the landlord is slowly raising them each year to market. If he can’t do this he has to rennovict or something else because he’s losing money each year. You can’t expect or ask landlords to lose money, cut profit margins but not losses. Inflationary increases at market rents is fine but below market rentals should be allowed to raise it faster than inflation. Again it’s not like we have many empty rentals. We have less than 1% empty rentals and we can’t be hurting rental owners then expecting them and others to still be rental owners. We need to work with them so everyone’s happy.
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On Immigrants, the numbers should be halved, either that or we should make it mandatory new migrants settle outside of Vancouver and Toronto. The population decline is mostly a myth anyway, population will increase if it becomes fiscally feasible to raise children in ur society, currently it isn't as the costs are prohibitive. This is why the NDP wants a universal childcare system which i strongly support. Better to have our own in Canada born and raised here to import citizens of convenience to subsidize the programs Canadians demand from our government.
If canada let in say 150k immigrants a year we wouldn't have the crisis we have now to nearly the same degree, the immigrants would integrate easier and not form urban ethnic enclaves as easily, and Canada's population would NOT decline.
Furthermore a LOT of the immigrants let into Canada are outside of working age to begin with, such family reunification policies are fiscally irresponsible.
On #7, again the exemption exists for landlords, if they can prove that they must raise prices to recuperate costs than they can apply to do so, this is a better policy than just letting them hike it willy nilly.
Renter security matters, housing is a home first and foremost, it shouldn't be treated as an investment yet it is being so. Raising the costs by inflation per year is reasonable as that can easily be absorbed by renters, inflation +2% adds up a LOT and many are finding themselves under water because of it. This year my rent went up $31 a month, if 4.5% remained in place next year I would have seen a rent hike of $36. That might not seem much but when I started renting this unit back in 2015 I paid $725, in just 3 years the price has risen nearly $100, in only THREE years. My rent is low compared with many others, those paying even MORE find themselves in even worse of a situation than myself.
Inflation at 2.5% is still a $20 hike per month which is much easier to handle yes but still my income is barely keeping up with these raises. I only make $26k a year, not exactly able to handle such increases very easily without taking a ding to my quality of life and ability to be a productive participant in our local economy.
When you raise rents by more than the population can absorb their spending power decreases and the rest of the economy suffers as a result. raising by inflation annually is a compromise between landlords ability to turn a profit and Renters right to housing security.
Lastly, if you are renting below market and have lived in the same rental for 10 + years, that doesn't mean your below market is less than the costs to keep up with upkeep, especially since for 10 years now every year you've pocketed an additional 2% per year in rent increases above the local inflation rate.
again there are other ways to encourage rentals than allowing exorbitant rent hikes every year, these include expanding ICBC coverage to property insurance and offer a cheaper rate to landlords, this could also include offering a tax credit to landlords so that their costs of upkeep decline so that their enterprise is sustainable.
Why should reasonable tenants be the ones to suffer because of our governments inability to offer said incentives to landlords? Truth is, they shouldn't.
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