Rental zoning will give municipalities new tool to support affordable housing

Yesterday, I posted about the state of rental housing in the South of Fraser based on information compiled by the BC Non-Profit Housing Association. The short of it is that market rental housing is becoming less affordable for people in our region. In Langley City, close to half of renter households spend more that 30% of their income on housing. Spending more than 30% of a household’s income on housing costs is considered unaffordable.

Transportation costs are significant for most renter households. The Metro Vancouver Regional District has done research around how to increase affordability for households that make a moderate income. Langley City’s average household income is around $50,000 per year. This is considered a moderate income.

Pinetree Way in Coquitlam is near high-quality public transit

Metro Vancouver’s solution is to build rental housing near high-quality public transit. One of the challenges with this today is that land near high-quality transit normally goes for a premium. One of the ways around this is to zone areas near high-quality transit for rental housing. This would dampen increasing land costs, as it would reduce speculative practices. Rental zoning would encourage people to create rental buildings for the long-term. This will result in more rental units, stabilizing rents throughout our region.

Currently, local governments don’t have the power to create rental zones, but this is about to change. The provincial government has a bill that is currently working its way through the legislature that would allow municipalities to create rental zones.

In Langley City and Surrey, rental zoning could be applied along sections of Fraser Highway, 104 Avenue, and King George Boulevard near transit stops. It could also be applied along B-Line routes. One of the good things about the proposed new rental zoning is that local governments don’t have to take an all-or-nothing approach to creating rental housing. The proposed zone would allow a municipality to make anywhere from 1% to 100% of building housing units rental within the zone. This would work well for mixed-use buildings.

While the provincial and federal governments hold most of the power to create affordable housing, the proposed new rental zoning will give local governments the ability to encourage affordable rental units for moderate income households in our region.