什么情况？Vacancy rate dips again in 2017

对老向是好事情。

 

Can't find an apartment in Ottawa? Vacancy rate dips again in 2017
Jon Willing
Updated: July 3, 2018

In Nepean, there was a vacancy rate of 3.6 per cent in 2016. The tightest rental market was in the Glebe and Old Ottawa South with a vacancy rate of 0.2 per cent. File photo

The City of Ottawa’s latest annual development report underscores how hard it is for renters to find a place to live in the nation’s capital.

The 2017 rental vacancy rate was 1.7 per cent, compared with three per cent in 2016.

The report, citing figures from Canadian Mortgage and Housing Corp., says the rental supply of apartments and rowhouse units only increased 0.9 per cent last year. The total number of those types of units was 69,573.

A separate and growing category is the number of condo units being rented. There was a seven-per-cent increase in the supply of condo rental units in 2017 and the overall percentage of condo units being rented out was 30.3 per cent, up from 20.7 per cent in 2012.

Condo rentals are becoming a big part of the supply of rental units, but as the report points out, they’re often limited to people who can afford to pay more.

The annual development report, which is a gold mine of information about local development and population trends, was published Tuesday ahead of a planning committee meeting next Tuesday.

The rental statistics reveal a downward trend in the local vacancy rate since 2015, but the rate historically has been lower, even dipping below 0.5 per cent in the early 1980s and in 2000.

The hardest rentals to find are one-bedroom apartments, which had a 1.4-per-cent vacancy rate in 2017. Bachelor units had a 1.6-per-cent vacancy rate and two-bedroom units had a 2.1-per-cent vacancy rate.

According to the report, the average monthly rent for a two-bedroom apartment in Ottawa in 2017 was $1,232, an increase of 2.6 per cent from 2016. There are rent controls in Ontario, with increases for existing tenants limited to 1.5 per cent in 2017, but landlords can charge whatever they want when a unit is empty.

It’s cheaper to live across the Ottawa River.

The average monthly rent for a two-bedroom apartment in Gatineau last year was $782 and, according to the report, the cost gap between Gatineau and Ottawa for that type of unit was similar to the gap in 2016.

When it comes to Ottawa, renters in search of homes provided by the private sector might have the best luck finding a place in Nepean, where there was a vacancy rate of 3.6 per cent in 2016. The tightest rental market was in the Glebe and Old Ottawa South with a vacancy rate of 0.2 per cent.

As for businesses, the vacancy rate for commercial office space decreased to 11.4 per cent at the end of 2017 from 12.4 per cent in 2016. Industrial vacancy rate dipped to 6.3 per cent last year from 7.7 per cent in 2016, and the retail vacancy rate in 2017 was 5.5 per cent, compared to 5.3 per cent in 2016.

Overall household growth in Ottawa continues to be driven by the southern suburbs. The communities of Leitrim and Riverside South had the largest household growth rates in 2017 at 5.7 per cent and 5.1 per cent, respectively. The citywide growth rate for households was 1.6 per cent.

The city registered a big year for housing starts in 2017 at 6,849, the most annual starts since 2004 when there were 6,879.

 

‘Fantastically good’ Canadian economy shifts focus to BoC rate hike
By Greg Quinn Bloomberg
The Star, Tues., Aug. 7, 2018

OTTAWA—Canada’s economy is gaining strength instead of buckling amid a trade fight with the U.S.

Exports rose to a record high in June even as President Donald Trump slapped tariffs on steel and aluminum, and gross domestic product expanded in May at its fastest clip in a year, according to data released this week by Statistics Canada.


Economists are predicting second-quarter growth of more than 3 per cent and talking about the possibility of a second-straight rate increase from the Bank of Canada. (Justin Tang / THE CANADIAN PRESS file photo)

That has economists predicting second-quarter growth of more than 3 per cent and talking about the possibility of a second-straight rate increase from the Bank of Canada. Another move from the central bank next month was considered a long shot until now, as trade threats continue to cloud Prime Minister Justin Trudeau’s economic agenda.

“It’s a fantastically good week for Canada on the economic side,” Jean-Francois Perrault, chief economist at Bank of Nova Scotia, said by phone. Scotiabank became the first major Canadian commercial lender to predict a September rate increase this week, with the other four big banks still calling for Governor Stephen Poloz to hold fire until October.

Poloz raised rates at the central bank’s July meeting, the fourth move in a year, and said further increases could be needed with the economy operating near capacity. The governor told reporters trade risks are just that, reiterating that policy-makers will be guided by incoming data instead of political rhetoric.

“The Bank of Canada is on course to raise rates in the coming months, and while our callremains for a hike in October, a September move isn’t out of the cards,” Royce Mendes, a senior economist at Canadian Imperial Bank of Commerce, wrote in a research note.

Investors were putting the odds of a rate hike in September at about one in four Friday afternoon, up from one in five a week earlier. The odds for October were two in three.

Another key variable in the Bank of Canada’s rate calculus will be pinned down next week, with jobs figures due Friday. Citibank’s economic surprise index, which measures how data compares to market expectations, turned positive this week for the first time since February.

“The economy is still humming along,” Dawn Desjardins, assistant chief economist at Royal Bank of Canada, said Friday in a phone interview. Policy-makers “will continue to gradually remove the stimulus because the economy is really running up against capacity constraints.”

To be sure, U.S. protectionism could still side-swipe Canada — especially if Trump follows through on threats to put tariffs on automobiles, one of the nation’s top exports. Cross-border relations frayed somewhat this week, when Trudeau’s minister in charge of talks to update the North American Free Trade Agreement was left out of discussions between U.S. and Mexican officials, according to three people familiar with the matter.

Perrault said Scotiabank was nonetheless confident in advancing its prediction for a rate hike, because even bilateral talks showed progress on NAFTA. Canada’s growth rate still reflects a drag from trade uncertainty, which could be lifted should a deal be reached between the three nations ahead of U.S. midterm elections this fall.

“Capacity pressures are forcing firms to invest,” Perrault said. “Maybe they are investing reluctantly, but they are investing.”