Begining in 2022, Council has voted in favour of some developers having to include affordable housing units in their projects. Condominiums with 100 or more units must set aside five to 10 per cent of their total square footage for affordable rental and ownership units at first. By 2030 this is expected to gradually increase to anywhere from 8-22%.
To break it down for you, this would mean that a one-bedroom apartment would therefore go for $1,090 a month while two-bedroom apartments would go for $1,661 and three-bedroom apartments would go for $1,858. This directly impacts households making between $32,486 and $91,611 per year, who would have the opportunity to live without shelling out more than 30 per cent of their monthly income on housing costs.
Ownership costs would be capped at $190,100 for a one-bedroom unit, $242,600 for a two-bedroom unit or $291,700 for a three-bedroom unit.
This was a welcome change in our city, where it often feels like affordable housing and efforts to aid those that need it the most materialize at a snails pace. There is definiately much more to be done and there are backlogs of folks that pay the ultimate price to prove this, but this is a step in the right direction. Here’s to seeing more policy reform at the right levels of government for everyone in our city to benefit ????.