Low vacancy rate will be challenge for plan to move Manitoba Housing tenants into private market: association
'It's really hard to try to find something with not that good of a budget,' says Manitoba Housing tenant
The provincial government has proposed helping Manitoba Housing tenants move into private rental units as part of its strategy to fight homelessness, but that idea may come with its own challenges, says a group representing property managers.
The government's long-term homelessness plan, unveiled earlier this week, includes freeing up space for supportive and transitional housing in Manitoba Housing buildings for people living in encampments, in part by helping current Manitoba Housing tenants find homes in the private market.
At least one tenant currently living in a subsidized housing unit said she would be willing to move into a privately owned suite, if the province offered her additional financial support.
"I've been looking but it's really hard to try to find something with not that good of a budget," said Leanne Dacey, a single mom who works full time and has lived in three different Manitoba Housing units over the past eight years.
Professional Property Managers Association of Manitoba spokesperson Avrom Charach said he "loves the idea," but landlords already have waiting lists for prospective tenants and have a limited number of affordable units to offer up.
"You're talking about a few hundred units available and thousands of people looking for them," he said.
"It's a bad time to do the program because of that."
Landlords have been pushing for expanded portable shelter benefits — meaning subsidies tied to a person, rather than a unit — to help get people into private market suites, he said.
The latest Canada Mortgage and Housing Corporation data shows Winnipeg's vacancy rate sitting below its 10-year average, at 1.7 per cent, with the average monthly rent for a two-bedroom suite at just over $1,500 per month.
Charach said most of the vacancy is either in larger, more expensive units, or "very inexpensive units, which often are less desirable — which may be what the people from [Manitoba] Housing take, but you hope they get good, safe units no matter what."
'I'm just making it by right now'
Tessa Blaikie Whitecloud, announced Monday as the premier's new senior adviser on ending chronic homelessness, said working with Manitoba Housing tenants will require taking a "person-centred approach."
Part of the strategy will involve finding Manitoba Housing tenants who are "ready, maybe, to move on" to the private market, she said.
"It will be about making sure those rent subsidies are there, it will be about making sure there is support, [so] that if something does fall apart in the first little while, there's a way to make sure that doesn't lead to homelessness for somebody," Blaikie Whitecloud, who is heading up the new homelessness strategy, said in a Wednesday interview with CBC's Information Radio.
She also believes there are larger companies in the private market that "want to be part of the solution" and may have units "to give up to a strategy like this, to make sure that we can do the right thing by our neighbours in Winnipeg who are currently experiencing life on the street."
Manitoba Housing rent is geared to income. Based on her income, Dacey pays $826 a month. She's been browsing the private rental market and recently found a two-bedroom unit listed at $1,100 per month — well below Winnipeg's average, but she'd need another $275 in support from the province to make the move.
"I'm just making it by right now with paying $826 a month," she said.
A spokesperson for the Manitoba government said details aren't yet available on how much additional financial support it would be willing to give Manitoba Housing tenants to help them transition to a private market unit.
Talia Potash, director of housing for Resource Assistance for Youth and a member of the advocacy group Right to Housing Coalition, has concerns about moving Manitoba Housing tenants into the private market.
"It's taking folks that are stably housed, and they're paying rent-geared-to-income. Many of them will have lived in Manitoba Housing for many years, because that's the population they're going to target as having successful tenancies, and therefore having the ability to move into the private market," Potash said.
"There's going to be pushback from people … [who] don't want to be moving."
Potash said private market units could also potentially be more precarious for tenants, depending on where the building is located and who runs it.
"What we need from the government is more of an investment in actual housing," she said.
Charach said he's not aware of any private landlords who have been contacted by the province yet.
He said while many want to be "good social citizens," he cautioned the province to temper its expectations.
"I have concerns with how it will work, because you're dealing with people, not just moving chess pieces around."
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