It’s about the time of year for us first-years to start panicking. As we realize the year is quickly drawing to a close, we have to think about moving out of residence, getting a summer job, and, perhaps most importantly, where we are going to live next year. After browsing on Kijiji for hours on end, jaw dropping repeatedly as landlords demand $2500 a month for a dingy little box in a basement, it has dawned on me just how expensive rent in Toronto is, and it inspired me to look into how big of an issue this is.
“It was totally shocking,”
Said Nicole Meredith as the price of her one-bedroom condo spiked from $1,275/month to $1,700 a month with a mere 90-day notice. She’s afraid she can no longer afford to live or work downtown. It seems the affordable places are unkempt and deteriorating, as depicted Ashley Jennings’ description of her $1,100/month apartment at Yonge and St. Claire.
“We had mice constantly coming into our unit. Radiators that kept us up all night screaming. Walls, floors, and ceilings that were cracking.”
According to a 2018 survey, Toronto has the world’s ninth least affordable housing market, with residential prices increasing by around 150% between 2005 and 2018. This is in parallel to the increasing debt-to-disposable-income ratio in the average Canadian household and the fact that 48% of Toronto consists of low-income neighbourhoods where the average individual income is $32,000 before taxes. What does this mean? That a large proportion of Torontonians may only be able to afford a decent place to live with a missing kidney or two.
With such a high proportion of their income stolen by the housing market, one is likely to be forced to move out into the suburbs. The additional material and mental costs of commuting to work daily may leave them with no option but to find a job elsewhere. In addition to driving people out of the city, the exorbitantly high rental prices have peripheral effects on homelessness in Toronto. Every night, more than 9,200 people are homeless, and 76% of them claim all they need is help paying rent to get out of their situations.
The most recent plan to solve this issue was proposed by Mayor John Tory after his election and involves building 40,000 affordable housing units. This 2020-2030 HousingTO plan was officially approved by the Toronto City Council last December. However, the city is still waiting on another $14.9 billion from the province to move forward and has only set aside $5.5 billion of its required $8.5 billion contribution to the project. Additionally, Toronto does not have the best track record for keeping its promises, as the previous “Affordable Housing Action Plan 2010-2020” which aimed to approve 1,000 affordable units a year was only successful in 2 of the 10 years.
It’s uncertain whether the city can sustain its people for the next decade, as the average Torontonian certainly does not make the $34.90 per hour required to rent a one-bedroom in the 10th percentile. We must keep pressing the council to proceed with HousingTO as planned. We cannot let any more of our fellow residents be shoved out onto the streets by the soaring cost of living in the city.
References:
https://journals-sagepub-com.myaccess.library.utoronto.ca/doi/10.1177/0042098019881368
Click to access backgroundfile-140650.pdf
https://thetyee.ca/Analysis/2019/08/01/Gov-Created-Housing-Crisis-Now-Fix/
https://www.cbc.ca/news/canada/toronto/housing-municipal-election-1.4820215
5 Causes Behind The Toronto Housing Crisis
g l a s s m a z e . c o 
2 replies on “Long Blog 1 – A kidney for your dwelling”
I absolutely agree.
Housing is way too expensive in the city and something most definitely needs to be done. It’s quite shocking to see how much someone needs to make an hour in order to pay for the minimal housing available. I commute downtown every day and have been looking for an affordable place for quite some time, however, it’s just too hard to find!
Hopefully, something will be done to fix this situation.
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I really love living in Toronto, but I fear I that I won’t be able to as the housing market is insane and unjustified. I would expect such a rise if minimum wage had gone up significantly consistently over the past ten years, but I don’t see a direct correlation. This problem also encourages the construction of multiple suburbs in the GTA. Not necessarily a problem, but I find it interesting that new cities are being built to try and replicate the metropolis of Toronto. Kinda similar to how we often count the areas in the GTA as Toronto, like we’re trying our best to include everyone in the city.
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