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The Dalmatian
Uses: rental, civic
Address: 1025 Johnson Street
Municipality: Victoria
Region: Downtown Victoria
Storeys: 11
The Dalmatian is an 11-storey mixed-use affordable rental tower in the 1000-block of Johnson Street in downtow... (view full profile)
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[Harris Green] The Dalmatian | Victoria No. 1 Firehall | Rentals, office space | Completed - Built in 2023


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#381 G-Man

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Posted 09 October 2019 - 09:04 AM

Exactly. So we should try and work within that system by letting the supply increase as much as possible to lower prices. Also I would argue most people are not moving to Victoria because it is the best place to work. The work is okay but it is because it is a beautiful place.
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#382 Mike K.

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Posted 09 October 2019 - 09:25 AM

There is literally no other factor in the high cost of housing other than "greed" because this is the system that society has agreed to use to allocate land.  Manipulating the market with things like zoning and density regulations is still part of the system and at it's root, greed on the part of landowners who want higher resale values and return on their investment. Greed makes people want to move to where they can make the best living so population in a limited geographic area increases.

 

Doesn't society, i.e. elected civic officials, and the opinions of the electorate, dictate zoning? A developer must pursue approvals for zoning changes and density. They are not in control of zoning, elected officials and the public are. And by controlling zoning, density and development, elected officials control the supply of housing. That supply dictates the price of said housing and/or the value of land.

 

You have your theory backwards, it looks like.


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#383 Nparker

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Posted 09 October 2019 - 09:27 AM

...by controlling zoning, density and development, elected officials control the supply of housing...

Precisely.



#384 Mike K.

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Posted 09 October 2019 - 10:12 AM

Again, we need to go back to the symbiotic relationship playing out here.

 

A city needs developers to pursue the highest and best use of land in order to realize the highest taxation amounts and therefore provide enough resources for the city to operate to the standards expected of its electorate.

 

Tedward mentioned in another thread that he wants someone else to pay for his children's bus passes, and that someone else could very well be the City of Victoria if its plan to supply children with bus passes (discounted or at no cost to the child) materializes. That service would require $1.6 to $6 million in resources, also known as taxation, which is generated through the efforts of developers pursuing development to create the highest and best uses for land, and the highest level of taxation the municipality can realize.

 

Tedward's desire for no-cost transportation for his children is no different than the City's desire to pursue the highest and best use of land within its borders, and a developer's desire to provide the highest and best use for the City and in return to the residents/leaseholders of their projects. The needs/desires/wants are all identical in their purest form, but it all starts with only one of those groups: the developer.

 

Furthermore, if not for the developer's efforts, the overall level of taxation would rise at a significantly higher rate as those bus passes would be taxed to a finite group of taxpayers who are also on the hook for thousands of other rising costs throughout the municipality. Those taxpayers appreciate more taxpayers to lessen their financial burden.


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#385 Mike K.

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Posted 09 October 2019 - 01:52 PM

Oh, btw there's a new website for the project at https://johnsoncookyates.com/


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#386 spanky123

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Posted 09 October 2019 - 03:01 PM

Exactly. So we should try and work within that system by letting the supply increase as much as possible to lower prices. Also I would argue most people are not moving to Victoria because it is the best place to work. The work is okay but it is because it is a beautiful place.

 

Adding supply has not lowered prices in the past when it comes to housing in Victoria. All that happens is that demand from out of market increases to offset. If you are hoping that a massive build out will drop your rent to $700 a month or your rancher to $400K then you will be waiting a long time.



#387 G-Man

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Posted 09 October 2019 - 03:06 PM

We haven't added supply in excess of new residents to the city for as long as I have lived here.
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#388 aastra

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Posted 09 October 2019 - 03:45 PM

I hope nobody seriously thinks that adding a few units here or there is going to magically lower the average house price by 40%. It's like when you encourage somebody to eat healthier or get some exercise or whatever, so after 25 years he finally dares to take a tiny nibble of a carrot... and then complains because it didn't instantly cure a lifetime worth of ailments.

 

I posted this old article just the other day:

 

 

Condo boom opens rental market
Times-Colonist
March 3, 1994

A surge in condominium construction has opened up the rental market, giving Victoria tenants the best deal they've had in years...

"We're in the softest period I've experienced in several years," said Rob Hunter, president of Devon Properties...

Vacancies among the several thousand units Devon manages are around 2 per cent, double the rate of a year ago.

Hunter said the softer rental market is due to the increase in wood-frame condominium projects. With low mortgage rates, many people are able to qualify for 95-per-cent financing to buy a unit.

One sign of the higher vacancy rate was the 10 columns of classified ads for apartments and condos for rent in the Times- Colonist Wednesday, and four more columns of townhouses, duplexes and houses.

The larger number of vacancies means rents have flattened out, and even dropped in a few cases.

The renter's market also extends to houses. Jeff Sawchuk of Adler Properties Ltd., which manages apartments and single-family homes, said house rents are in a holding pattern.

"We're advising our clients not to raise rents, for the second year in a row," he said.

However, he said existing tenants find it hard to buy a house or condo. Fewer than 10 per cent are able to swing a down payment and monthly mortgage payments given Victoria's high prices, he said.

Sales of units in new buildings are still "quite high," King said, but "what we're seeing is the potential for oversupply of mainly four-storey wood-frame buildings along main arterials."


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#389 Mattjvd

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Posted 09 October 2019 - 03:52 PM

Adding supply has not lowered prices in the past when it comes to housing in Victoria. All that happens is that demand from out of market increases to offset. If you are hoping that a massive build out will drop your rent to $700 a month or your rancher to $400K then you will be waiting a long time.


It's not going to drop rent from 1400 to 700, it may drop rent from 1400 to 1350 over a year or two period. The quantity of supply that has been added for the last 3 or 4 years would need to keep up for a decade to make a significant impact. It's very unlikely that that will happen, so you need to add every unit you possibly can while developers are hungry to build. Council should be asking for MORE density, and more units in projects.
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#390 aastra

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Posted 09 October 2019 - 04:18 PM

For sure. Suffice it to say, you always need to be adding supply. It's not an optional thing. We know it, we've seen it, we've lived it.... many times. If you take a break from doing it or if you try to scheme up flaky alternatives because you mistakenly believe you have the power to turn reality on its head then it's 100% guaranteed that reality will bite you on the rear sooner or later (in Victoria's case the housing crunch tends to bite soon and often, as demonstrated by the old news items).

 

Thinking you've added enough housing and won't ever need more is like thinking you've had enough rain and won't ever need more.



#391 IPH

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Posted 09 October 2019 - 04:52 PM

Adding supply has not lowered prices in the past when it comes to housing in Victoria. All that happens is that demand from out of market increases to offset. If you are hoping that a massive build out will drop your rent to $700 a month or your rancher to $400K then you will be waiting a long time.

Its simple supply and demand.  Supply has not kept up with demand.  it doesn't mater if the demand is from existing residents or out of towners looking for an investment, a pied-a-terre, or future retirement home, demand is demand.  if supply does not match or exceed that demand market prices go up.  if supply matches demand prices hold, if supply outpaces demand then prices go down! 

 

Dropping your rent by $700 or a rancher to $400K would require a massive increase in supply that wont happen in Victoria with the lack of available land, current construction costs and all the government red tape and community opposition.  if you want to lower your rent by $700/M or a $400K rancher then all you have to do is move to somewhere like rural Saskatchewan with cheep and plentiful land and no government red tape or costs.  If enough people moaning about the cost of housing did just that demand would decrease and the problem would be solved.   


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#392 spanky123

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Posted 10 October 2019 - 06:42 AM

^ What many of us have been saying all along. There is no affordability crisis in small town Canada. It is the opposite, most towns are struggling to keep the population they have. Today's young adults have been told that they have the right to live wherever they want, work their precarious jobs and then only pay the rent they feel they should have to! That is the crisis.

 

In urban areas a good portion of the housing crunch has been a result of a demographic shift to single living. Even if the population had not increased by a single person, we would still be short on housing as the number of people wanting to live along has gone from 30% to nearly 70%.


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#393 G-Man

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Posted 10 October 2019 - 08:10 AM

That is true and Victoria has a higher rate of single living than almost anywhere in the country but that is likely a skew from older women whose male partners have died rather than millenials. In Oaklands the group UVic houses are still group UVic houses.

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#394 Mike K.

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Posted 10 October 2019 - 08:13 AM

Wanting to live alone and living alone are two different things, and while the desire to live alone has increased, so has the financial reality of doing so so we’re not seeing a surge in single-occupant living in terms of occupancy rates. If anything, young people are less likely to move out of the family home until closer to marriage age (late 20s/early 30s) as opposed to early 20s in decades prior.

Between 2006 and 2016, Statistics Canada reports an unchanged 1.8 persons per dwelling in the City of Victoria with one-person households rising from 20,535 to 22,170, or 163.5-units per year. Total households increased to 49,212 from 44,783, or 443-units per year.

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#395 Mike K.

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Posted 10 October 2019 - 09:10 AM

Municipal and federal policies represent the biggest barriers to creating housing. At both levels, we need to be collaborating; regulators and industry, to identify and remove barriers to housing supply. Inclusionary zoning, development cost charges and amenity contribution increases are just a few of the top-of-mind challenges developers are facing these days. The challenges are compounded by the complex layers of engagement that are required in order to justify housing that already meets the Official Community Plan (OCP) and the Local Area Plan (LAP) that governs the use for a given site.

It’s been proven that affordable housing is directly tied to housing supply, yet governments are trying to solve the problem through mechanisms that are further limiting housing supply. I believe an awakening is happening among the general public, evidenced by the numerous housing advocacy groups that are emerging. We are really seeing this wave in larger markets like Vancouver and San Francisco, but I believe Victoria is not far behind.


- Mike Miller, talking about challenges in Victoria's housing market.

 

https://victoria.cit...t-developments/


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#396 baconnbits

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Posted 10 October 2019 - 01:58 PM

^ What many of us have been saying all along. There is no affordability crisis in small town Canada. It is the opposite, most towns are struggling to keep the population they have. Today's young adults have been told that they have the right to live wherever they want, work their precarious jobs and then only pay the rent they feel they should have to! That is the crisis.

 

In urban areas a good portion of the housing crunch has been a result of a demographic shift to single living. Even if the population had not increased by a single person, we would still be short on housing as the number of people wanting to live along has gone from 30% to nearly 70%.

the upshot of this statement is that if more people want to live alone then there should be more demand for housing units. the size of the units demanded might now be smaller as a result of the nature of that demand, but it is nevertheless demand. if supply isn't keeping up with t his demand in overall units let alone the right units, demand will continue to outstrip supply and put upward pressure on prices/rents.

 

doesnt matter how you slice it. supply is less than demand.  talk of demand being from outside forces feeds into the foreign buyers, vacancy and investors taxes.  some of that is fine if that's what you want to encourage but i haven't seen prices overall decline in victoria. even vancouver, the decline has been at the high end. it has hardly made things more affordable for the average joe.

 

this development is providing affordable and a firehall. no matter how you slice it, there is a cost here. it happens here that its an opportunity cost but a cost nonetheless.  and now people want other amenities and fees on top of this.  i dont quite get that. seems like having your cake and eating it to but that's just my thoughts.


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#397 aastra

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Posted 10 October 2019 - 03:11 PM

 

In urban areas a good portion of the housing crunch has been a result of a demographic shift to single living.

 

Meanwhile, one of the most common complaints when discussing the housing crisis (whether today, ten years ago, or 50 years ago) is the pressing need for more two- and three-bedroom apartments.

 

 

CBC article:

...the project doesn't meet the needs of the many middle-income families in Victoria who need more space to raise a family. "[We need] a lot more two or three bedroom units,"

 

 

Globe and Mail:

The vacancy rate for three-bedroom apartments on (Prince Edward) island? Zero.

 

We just can't keep our story straight. We've twisted ourselves in knots in our ongoing effort to deny the fundamental underlying issue: people need/want places to live, and yet we continue to clamp down on the construction of places to live.

 

--

 

Victorian: Hey, what do you think of the housing crisis?

 

Other Victorian: Oh, it's so terrible. People are suffering. People have been suffering for 50 years. It's so sad. (sniff)

 

Victorian: Hey, what do you think of the plan to build apartments on the Mazda dealership site and on the old fire station site after the fire department relocates?

 

Other Victorian: I'm 100% opposed! Those properties should be new park space! Over my dead body will I allow more ****ing apartments in my neighbourhood!

 

(pause as Victorian gives Other Victorian the stink eye)

 

Other Victorian: But back to the housing crisis... yeah, it's just so, so sad. (sniff)


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#398 tedward

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Posted 11 October 2019 - 08:01 AM

A city needs developers to pursue the highest and best use of land in order to realize the highest taxation amounts and therefore provide enough resources for the city to operate to the standards expected of its electorate.

 

Yup, not arguing against that. What you seem to refuse to acknowledge is that for-profit developers want to maximize their return and thus nothing ever do will significantly reduce or even constrain the cost of housing and I'm not asking them to.

The ONLY solution IMO is a significant number of not-for-profit developers who are able to build without pursuing maximum profit as a goal but maximum affordability while still covering all costs. 

We need a healthy mix of for-profit and not-for-profit developers who are allowed to build to a far higher density in this city. 


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#399 Victoria Watcher

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Posted 11 October 2019 - 08:06 AM

We need a healthy mix of for-profit and not-for-profit developers who are allowed to build to a far higher density in this city. 

 

what's the mix now?  who defines what is healthy?  if for-profits only have so much money and so can only start say 11 projects by 2025 should we hold up private development to keep your perfect mix/ratio intact?


Edited by Victoria Watcher, 11 October 2019 - 08:06 AM.


#400 Mike K.

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Posted 11 October 2019 - 09:48 AM

Yup, not arguing against that. What you seem to refuse to acknowledge is that for-profit developers want to maximize their return and thus nothing ever do will significantly reduce or even constrain the cost of housing and I'm not asking them to.

The ONLY solution IMO is a significant number of not-for-profit developers who are able to build without pursuing maximum profit as a goal but maximum affordability while still covering all costs. 

We need a healthy mix of for-profit and not-for-profit developers who are allowed to build to a far higher density in this city. 

 

The valuation of real-estate is pretty simple. You and I, the homeowner, control the cost of real-estate in our communities. 99% of the homes in our region are already built and owned by you and I, and upon resale, you and I, representing that 99% of inventory, set the sale price we feel is appropriate (collectively the buyer and seller each decide the best price, and the property is sold if they agree to it).

 

Developers, representing 1% of housing stock, take a risk by deciding their course of action based on the following questions:

- what is the cost of land?

- what is the cost of construction?

- what are the costs of bringing a project before council?

- what are the rates consumers are willing to pay?

 

Based on the activities of the 99% (you and I), and the transactions that occur between you and I, the developer will have his answer for the last question.

 

If you really want to see change in your community, you should question why your neighbours who bought a home in 2005 for $350,000 are listing it 14 years later for $1.2 million. Their profit on that transaction (never mind the carrying costs, etc.) is significantly higher than the profit a developer will make by selling a unit which cost him $1.15 million to bring to market for $1.25 million. And before you say "developers are responsible for increases," remember their activities represent only a fraction of overall sales activity.

 

You catch what I'm saying, right? The developer needs the general public to sell their homes for a price that is at or just slightly above the cost of bringing new construction to market, so that the developer has a market for his homes, which will cost a little higher by virtue of being new construction and inclusive of present-day costs to build them. But the developer also can't overshoot the market by building a home valued to a buyer at $1.25 million for $1.45 million. There's no market at that price, so the developer goes bankrupt if it cost him $1.35 million to build it.

 

Anyways, we're way off tangent here but that point I'd like to make is we need to get away from this mindset that developers are greedy. They're just doing a job, and it takes a lot of knowledge, expertise, connections and financing to do it. But the best thing is anyone can be a developer. There is no formal training, certification of education required.


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