Charlottetown business group calls on province to remove rent controls

Some business owners in Charlottetown have made suggestions for increasing the city's housing supply, but not everyone is happy with their recommendations when it comes to rental properties.

The Greater Charlottetown Area Chamber of Commerce's housing report resulted from roundtables and consultations between business owners, landlords and residential developers back in September.

The chamber's members said in the report that Charlottetown's short supply of housing is hurting their business and keeping them from finding enough workers because potential employees can't find a place to live.

"It's hard to bring people in and expand your business if they can't find a home [and] if they can't mirror the quality of life from the jurisdiction they're coming from," said Bianca McGregor, the chamber's CEO.

"Housing, lack of primary care are a real pinch point when it comes to expanding a business and ensuring a good talent pipeline for small business."

P.E.I.'s housing situation has been described as a crisis since 2019, and the pressures are most prevalent in the province's capital city.

The vacancy rate for rental housing in Charlottetown fell from 0.8 per cent in 2022 to 0.5 per cent last year.

To meet the demands of its growing population, experts say the province would require more than 2,000 new housing units per year, a level P.E.I.hasn't seen since the late-1970s.

The chamber of commerce report recommends eight improvements that include reducing permitand regulatory delays for to building new housing, expanded funding programs for developers, and reducing minimum lot requirements.

New units right now... are artificially overpriced because the act doesn't allow [landlords] to do the increases they want to over time. Bianca McGregor, Greater Charlottetown Area Chamber of Commerce

It also calls for an amendment to the province's Residential Tenancy Act to let landlordsincrease rents to market rates after a tenant voluntarily vacates a unit.

Currently, rent is tied to the unit and not the tenant, meaning property owners can't legally increase the rent before a new tenant moves in.

"Landlords like to keep the property in good condition for the tenants," said June Ellis, executive director of the Residential Rental Association of P.E.I., which represents around 60 property owners.

"If a tenant moves out, a landlord does not have the funds to put new flooring in, redo the kitchen countertops which is unfortunate for the new tenant coming in."

Ellis said the association has heard from several owners that are considering sellingor already have sold because they can't break even or make a profit under the act's restrictions.

'It's nonsense'

For housing advocates, though, eliminating those rent control rules from the Residential Tenancy Act doesn't make sense.

Cory Pater, a volunteer with the P.E.I. Fight for Affordable Housing, called the chamber report's recommendation "ridiculous."

"It's nonsense, and quite frankly I think it shows the entitlement of developers and landlords," he said."This is a need and not just a commodity, like a TV or something that you can pick up, trade and basically only exists to make money off of, but that's how we've done housing."

From the perspective of the chamberand the landlords, however, rental costs will continue to growas property owners leave the market, leading to less housing supply and more competition for new units becoming available.

"New units right now, we would argue, are artificially overpriced because the act doesn't allow [landlords] to do the increases they want to over time, or the increases they might need to [do] once that asset becomes so old that it needs to have some maintenance to it," McGregor said.

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A report done for the Greater Charlottetown Area Chamber of Commerce says more homes have to be built faster, to let businesses attract new workers, and more has to be done to help investors who own housing units.

Pater said it all points to the need for more social and co-operative housing, to inch the city's tenantsawayfrom the private market.

Ellis said the market still needs a mix of both, though and argues that the majority of landlords are on the side of tenants.

"A lot of people get the wrong impression that landlords are making a clean fortune, which they're not," she said.

"It's a business. They have to at least break even and hopefully make some type of profit so they can put it back into the business."