To the inexperienced eye, wildebeests and human beings may not seem to have a lot in common. I, however, feel like I have shared a similar challenge as these great creatures –migrating to find a new home. Ottawa is a built-up city. It’s full of businesses, hotels and homes, yet it seems the travelling herd have settled down more quickly than I have.
The largest number of new homes are being built in the urban areas of the city. Ottawa is seeing an increase in first-time buyers between the ages of 25 to 35 and 55 to 74 year olds who want to downsize, according to Canadian Mortgage and Housing Corporation analyst Sandra Perez Torres.
This process of urbanization is forcing students, such as myself, as well as those just starting out, to fight over rented apartments and condos in the city.
When the fight is over, you can be left with some mangy looking places, or creepy roommates. I did manage to find myself a little leaky mouldy basement bedroom not too far from the university, but other people have to go further afield to find a place to live.
You don’t have to go far though to look for people who have struggled to find good rented accommodation.
While brewing my coffee in a local cafe, Ariane Gathelier, a French international student studying at the University of Ottawa, says that she had been looking for apartments for some time before settling in Vanier. She says she couldn’t understand how some people could live in the apartments she saw, given the terrible conditions – a toilet bowl metres from the tenant and infestations of ants.
I, too, had a hard time finding reasonable accommodation by the time I arrived in Ottawa. Classes had already started. Every other student seemed to be settled and happy, chatting away to new friends as I trudged by solemnly and disappointedly after viewing my latest flat.
Some of them weren’t too horrendous apart from the fact that you could hardly fit into the room. Others, such as the one with the lonely woman whose house was crawling with flies, were a lot worse.
What really boils the blood is that while walking around the streets of downtown Ottawa, I have seen properties boarded up, for seemingly no reason apart from the fact that no one has done anything with them.
In the area of King Edward and Rideau, for example, there's four large houses that have not been inhabited for four or five years, according to a local resident, even though they are owned by a property developer who’s supposed to be making them in to apartments.
It seems cruel that these houses are standing there, in the centre of town, ready to be fixed up and used, while so many younger people have to commute from apartments in places such as Vanier because there is nowhere closer to downtown to live.
Compounding the problem is that housing developments in the city centre are often too expensive for those with lower incomes. In July, anti-poverty activists protested against new Centretown condominiums that they considered unaffordable for many residents.
“Luxury” apartments replacing cheaper accommodation is a whack in the face to those with lower incomes. Everything seems to be getting bigger, but what is being forgotten is how much an average person can afford.
New condominiums are not where it stops for Centretown. There is an attempt to rebrand the area as “South Central.” This looks like an encouragement for class branding, an attempt at attracting a certain “type” of person.
James Meades, co–president of CUPE 4600 at Carleton University, is an anti-poverty activist who participated in the protest against new condos and for more affordable housing.
“Students are one group of people (that) can be targeted specifically by the growing costs of housing. A thousand dollars a month for a one bedroom apartment is normal. Housing can take up to 60 per cent of a student’s monthly income.” It’s what he calls the “student problem.”
It seems that these condominiums will be as unaffordable as the leafy suburban areas also out of reach for most students and young people.
If affordable accommodation keeps getting ripped down and turned into luxury apartments, there will be less standard living space for the ordinary resident, not just the students.
Without policy makers taking some initiative – creating below-market housing aimed directly at students – I suppose we’ll just have to settle for the tiny room that smells of cheese.