Housing for low-income single mothers in Regina in final stages

Maybell Developments is nearly finished the Twelve Home Project, providing temporary housing for low-income single mothers in Regina’s downtown.

MayBell Developments is prepared for the final stages of their 12-home project located in Regina’s downtown.

Located beside Trinity Evangelical Lutheran Church at the corner of Ottawa street and 12th Avenue, they are prepared for the final few weeks before the complex can house families. Paired with Lilium Childcare right next door, it will be an ideal setup for a certain demographic.

The housing is meant for low-income single mothers, who are currently in tough financial situations. The houses are a three-bedroom, one bathroom style that is meant to be occupied for two to five years. During that time span, MayBell Developments hopes to have the mothers ready to head out to the rental market once again. Rental rates are under the 30 per cent of income mark and will be set quarterly to accommodate.

“They’re small little units developed in a way that focuses on the relational aspect, so that we’re not focusing on the material per se,” said Victoria Aspinall, the board president and co-founder of Maybell Developments.

“Our women’s support workers will be working with every single family in these units to design an individualized case plan for them, that looks at how they are going to be building towards their future and how can we support them in that, as well as requirements to take our educational, programing, focusing on budgeting, building those soft job skills and tenancy training so that when they do eventually move out, they are well prepared to operate in society,”

Currently, four of the 12 units are occupied, and the complex has a waitlist of 30 applicants that they are filtering through. To apply, mothers must fill out an application on their website, followed by proof of low income, and then a final interview.

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“We are aware that they [tenants] won’t remain as low income going through the program, and that’s the design of the program, is that they will not remain in low income,” Aspinall said. “But that is our main category right now for these specific houses. We also require them to be single mothers, whether that means that they are pregnant at the time, looking to regain custody of their children, or already have custody of their children.”

While lack of housing continues to be an issue across the country, the construction of a project like this shows how long it takes until the people are actually housed.

MayBell originally started in 2015 but was looking at properties for this complex during the COVID-19 pandemic. An architect recommended a lot right beside the Trinity Evangelical Lutheran Church. A lease was signed in November 2021 and then approved by Regina city council in January 2022.

“It’s important at this time to have not just affordable housing, but affordable supportive housing,” Aspinall said. “We want to make sure that the people that we’re serving aren’t cycling through the affordable housing and then ending up where they were originally. It’s important to have that affordable housing in place, but it’s more important to have the support surrounding affordable housing.”

The complex will have a women’s support worker on hand as well, Juliana Paul, who will work with family on campus for their future.

The $3.45 million project construction started in January 2025 and is expected to be completed by the end of February.

This is the pilot project for Maybell Developments, but they say they’ll be looking to expand within the next five years. The vast amount of the project has originated from community funding.

“We do have funding from a few different streams, such as CMHC funding, including a forgivable loan portion, and we have funding from the City of Regina as well. Those are our two big funders. However, we also have funds coming from our community itself, so individual donors have done a fantastic job of stepping up to fund this community. We’ve also had quite a bit of support from our trades that are working on the actual project,” Aspinall explained.

According to Aspinall, the project has around $64,000 to spare. They look to make improvements on landscaping in the spring.