The next premier of BC!
Get more renters elected… of course, once they’re elected, they earn huge salaries, and after x many years they get life time pensions that are essentially paying similar to regular jobs (at least federally, not sure about prov, but likely similar).
This is a somewhat odd hill to start on for a new leader, and honestly not something I view as being core to the broader Green movement – more a recent student’s perspective on their own personal situation. The price of rent has come down about 8.5% since 2023, largely as a result of reducing immigration in flows. International issues and a strong isolationist/xenophobic trend are likely to persist, given the increasing issues with climate change globally and what we’re generally seeing go on internationally. So my “guess” is that trend will generally continue for a while still.
I think the fed approach is realistically more viable for addressing housing affordability long term, though it’s not clear how that’s going to impact BC as most of the announcements on that file have sorta excluded BC so far. Things like the northern power line stuff may also be important, as it ‘should’ open up more opportunities for business away from the traditional metropolitan areas.
Like you can break housing affordability issues down into three general areas, I reckon. Land costs, Construction costs and Financing costs. Rents tend to get set based loosely on those values. Trying to open up more areas in BC as ‘viable’ living areas for a younger generation aims to relieve the land cost pressures of living in major metropolitan areas: for ex. in Vancouver it’s common to see an older condo with ~$40k improvement value, but $500-600k land value, largely because there’s a limited amount of space near the more desirable areas. Putting in projects like the northern power transmission line, to provide more consistent utilities to the northern areas of the province, helps to make those areas more plausible as locations to move to (if you can also find a job etc!).
The fed’s aim of bolstering the pre-fab industry is taking on the issue of construction costs, hopefully. A more green variant on this approach would be to support the initiative, but target very sustainable and eco-‘prepared’ construction options. Providing govt incentives at the provincial level, so that prefab homes are more likely to include solar panels, flood mitigation, fire resistant sidings, etc.
And financing, well the province is busy packing up its financial sector. So the province has very little to do on that front really. But the cost of rent is often something you can work out based on recent mortgage rates – investors buy a property for X, at rate Y, and charge that amount directly to renters, relying on the increase in property value to fuel most of the investment gains. They’ll go for things like ‘interest only’ mortgages, for example, with an intention to ‘flip’ the property in 5-10 years (another reason for the evictions). Renters effectively provide coverage for the operating expenses between buying and selling the property. Part of the reason rents have come down in the past few years, is likely that interest rates have decreased, lowering the carrying costs for investors, which lowers costs for renters (with weakened demand).
To that point, rents need to fluctuate based partly on the financing costs, because if there’s zero profit for the investors, they simply won’t offer rental space: who would invest hundreds of thousands of dollars in a property, just so they could take a loss every year on the carrying costs? Having “low” fixed rent rates, but also mortgage terms that cycle every 3-5 years or so, won’t work for investors long term and is unsustainable. I’d suggest bolstering housing co-ops to help address this issue, to some extent – in the 1980s, they were a big part of helping people through the economic turmoil. If the govt reverses course and aims to keep its provincial financial institutions, they could also implement programs where the gov invests X amount at a CU, and the CU is tasked with loaning that money out to younger people/first time home buyers/housing co-ops at discounted rates. The gov would eat a cost in that their investment at the CU wouldn’t earn as much as it could directly, but they’d be bolstering the small/medium sized business CU’s portfolio while also underpinning the financial supports for younger/low income folks.
But yea, I’m not as optimistic about this green leaders approach. She’s popular amongst some GenZ, which it sounds like she essentially stuffed the party rosters with to get the leadership, but you realistically need to govern for the interests of the older generation too. I’m not convinced she realizes that.
