Intensification, rent control changes and shortage of stock give rise to new projects
It’s hard to imagine a more challenging time for business and markets than the past half year. With consumers running for cover and the international banking system imploding, what were developers and builders to do?
If you were Brian McCauley, executive vice-president of Vancouver-based Concert Properties, you were negotiating a deal with Diamante Development Corp. worth close to $20 million to acquire a condo site with approvals in place at Bay and Dundas Sts. His company will build the 26-storey, 448-unit project as a high-end rental.
“From a global perspective, Toronto is still a very strong marketplace in spite of the current softening that we’ve all experienced across Canada,” McCauley comments.
It also must be encouraging that Toronto’s apartment vacancy rate is at a seven-year low of 2 per cent, according to Canada Mortgage and Housing Corp. data, while vacancy rates for the subcategory of rented condos, representing newer apartment stock with substantially higher rents, is a microscopic 0.4 per cent, with rents almost 50 per cent higher than those in aging rental buildings.
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