Working people face homelessness as rental competition heats up

Workers facing homelessness over real estate costs A growing number of people who work in Metro Vancouver are facing the prospect of homelessness, being pushed out of the pricy market.

With the high demand for buying property and the lack of rental housing, some working Vancouverites could be facing homelessness.

Single mother Robyn Nelson said she is scrambling to find an affordable place to live with her two boys. Despite working as a hairdresser, Nelson is unable to find a place to rent in Metro Vancouver and said she has been on the search for a place across the Lower Mainland.

“We’re contending with at least 50 to 100 other people in all of these open houses,” Nelson told CTV News.

According to the latest homeless count in Vancouver, 26 per cent of people using emergency homeless shelters have jobs and almost one-third of the year-round shelter population have paying jobs.

“We’re in the middle of a serious housing crisis. People talk a lot about housing for purchase but it includes rental housing as well,” said Vancouver-Point Grey MLA and NDP housing critic David Eby.

The vacancy rate in Vancouver is now at 0.6 per cent and market listings have led to creative bidding wars.

The Twitter account called @DearYVRLandlord is dedicated to mocking Vancouver rental listings. One landlord of a 600 square-foot East Vancouver suite listed at $1150/month requested that potential renters help with yard work.

“…You must be very clean, quite, help with front lawn/garden,” the listing read.

Eby said the city’s housing crisis is causing a trickle-down effect where people who were formerly in middle-quality rental housing are pushed to low-quality housing and the trend continues until some people are forced onto the street.

“They apply and apply, and can’t get into rental housing and the result is that they literally become homeless,” he said.

Eby also said the AirBnB situation in Vancouver is “completely out of control” and the service shouldn’t prevent Vancouver residents from finding rental housing.

Nearly 10,000 people are on B.C. Housing’s list with a three-year wait, leaving people like Nelson uncertain about their future.

“I’m very angry about this. I’m [a] born-and-raised British Columbian, I’ve always worked, I’ve taken care of myself, I’ve never used the system and I could potentially find myself homeless in the very near future with my two children.”

With a report from CTV Vancouver’s Tom Popyk