Submitting for this truly astonishing quote:
" Landlords in Quebec, however, feel they need to catch up to other provinces as Quebec is still one of the most affordable places to live in the country, said Jean-Olivier Reed, a spokesperson for the Quebec Landlord Association (APQ)."
This is perfect and the various parties are surprisingly frank. For example:
and:
So Landlords want to jack up the rent there simply because of greed and feeling left out and they can’t afford to build houses. brilliant.
Often different groups, landlords and those who build, but yes.
That’s still good though. If there are people willing to move into those luxury places, they are probably freeing up some other capacity, and so on. More supply is never bad. As long as they are building in density, it will help with housing affordability.
The assumption that they’re freeing up other capacity isn’t necessarily true. There are several counter samples on my mind and there are probably more.
In fact one of the main points of the article is that Montreal has been building faster than population growth and housing is still drastically going up in price.
That’s because Montreal doesn’t exist in a vacuum. It’s maybe the only city in Canada with a remotely good approach to urbanism, and as a result one of the most affordable cities to buy housing in Canada. So there is added demand for Montreal real estate from the rest of the country, which contributes to rising prices.
What about house flippers?
How the hell does luxury=affordable to build. Affordable housing would be cheaper to build wouldn’t it?
What they meant to say was “we have built luxury housing because it is more profitable”
Those mean the same thing. Affordable for the developers = revenue - cost > 0. I think they said it explicitly a paragraph earlier, that they build what’s profitable.
Affordable housing can still be profitable to the land/building owner, It just isn’t as profitable. Under our capitalist system line must go up and profits come before providing enough housing for all.
Of course. But if the land/labor/materials have gone so high in price, it is possible that even with zero profit the final price for units goes beyond what is considered affordable housing. I don’t know if that’s the case in Montreal or not.
With that said, even if affordable housing is not profitable for land/building owner, it’s still “profitable” for the community around and in that future building. So from that angle, even if it’s unprofitable for the land/building owner, it should be “profitable” for the public/government. And if that’s the case, then it’s kinda pointless to rely on the market to find it profitable enough to build affordable housing.
But then someone would say that would mean some builders won’t make as much as they otherwise could which means line won’t go up as much, government bad, free market good, fml… ☠️
In any case, I think we should put the market in its place and build affordable housing without waiting for it to consider it profitable. That’s a perfect example where even creating new money can be a net benefit.