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Unaffordable
What happens when only the very wealthy can afford to live in Prince Edward County? What does the place look like when the last working family packs up and abandons the place? Will any schools remain? Playgrounds? Arenas? Will we recognize it? Can it still be called a community?
Only visitors and rich folk?
Perhaps then we will invest in public transit, in order to bring in staff every day to serve in our stores, to make our beds and prepare our meals. A naturally gated community with control at the bridges and tranquil living within the kingdom.
Each year, the County becomes unaffordable for an increasing number of folks who live here—or may wish to live here.
This generalized sense is confirmed by recent research from real estate broker Treat Hull. He also serves on council, representing Picton. In his most recent analysis of the County’s home resale market, Hull found the supply of homes priced under $300,000 has all but disappeared in the County. It has happened very quickly.
Hull reports that just five years ago more than two-thirds of the homes sold in the County went for under $300,000, whereas today it’s nearly half that. During same time period, the number of homes listed for sale under $300,000 has fallen by more than 80 per cent.
It may be soon that the last affordable house is sold in the County. Then what?
Hull and others use the $300,000 price point as a benchmark of affordability. Beyond this point, many on fixed incomes and working families are shut out of the market.
Already the folks who underpin our hospitality sector mostly commute from across the bridges. Foxboro has become a bedroom community of Prince Edward County. It’s likely not the slogan they want on their town stationery— but increasingly that is their lot.
Each of our personal circumstances is different, yet the evaporation of the home market valued under $300,000 is a red flag that ought to worry us all. It tells us, in stark and brutal terms, where we are headed in Prince Edward County. For unless something is done to disrupt this trend, it will continue to swallow up an ever-greater portion of this community’s diverse fabric. For a great many more people, this trend will end their dream of living in this community.
This steamroller is moving fast. Our policy makers must work faster.
It’s a supply and demand problem. Full stop. Strong demand, not enough supply. Virtually no supply. For nearly a decade we have been sitting on developable land comprising 1,700 building units—this according to a County white paper on housing. Yet we’ve built just 107 new homes each year on average, over the past five years—the largest portion in a single development at Wellington on the Lake. It is not nearly enough to sate the demand.
Worryingly, we are distracted by red herrings.
It is easy for folks to conclude that a surge in vacation rentals and the conversion of homes to Airbnb accommodation is driving the affordability crisis in the County. Policy makers should know better. It would be tragic if Shire Hall spent the next couple of years chasing, what is a global phenomenon, rather than addressing the core issue of a lack of supply.
Altering how folks use the dwindling stock of resale homes won’t build more homes. It won’t feed the demand for folks who want to live in this community. Vacation homes are a distraction from the core challenge.
There are several initiatives underway to propel affordable housing projects in the County. Council and Shire Hall are lending their expertise and support to these grassroots projects. We all must.
But we need more. Much more.
We must streamline approvals in order to facilitate new homebuilding across the County—preferably where existing waterworks services are provided, but not exclusively. We must be more creative and innovative in our thinking—particularly around the size and varieties of homes.
Council has dithered for a more than a year on whether or not to reduce the size of new home it will allow to the scale permitted by the Ontario Building Code—not a set of rules widely considered as cutting edge.
Time is running out for families in Prince Edward County. We can’t afford distracted or confused policy makers. Time goes by and the problems become worse. And much harder to fix.
In these final few months of their term of council, Mayor Robert Quaiff and his colleagues need to make housing a priority—above everything else. Stay focused on fixing the real problem. Deliver tangible solutions. Talk is costing folks their home.
Those who are interested to learn more about the home resale market and the trends driving it should seek out Treat Hull’s monthly insight, where he gleans data specifically and uniquely about the market in Prince Edward County at treathull.ca.
The County’s Official Plan Review on Housing can be found here.
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