There are certain life milestones that most Canadians aspire to: graduation, their first real-world job, purchasing their first home, and most significantly, starting a family.
Now, most people want to own their own home before having kids, the ease of mind and stability that homeownership offers is appealing, but unfortunately, homeownership is one of those milestones that is increasingly less and less attainable in Metro Vancouver. My wife and I moved into a two-bedroom apartment shortly before the arrival of our daughter. We are in our early thirties and have just started our family but chose to delay having our daughter by about three years as we attempted to get ahead financially.
With the average townhouse in the greater Vancouver region costing $796,800 and the average apartment costing $685,500, young want- to- be homeowners would need to save anywhere from $54,000 to $43,000 in a down payment alone. When you pair this with the exorbitant cost of rent in our region (on average $1,780 per month, or $21,000 a year) the ability to save up for a down payment becomes daunting. With the median household income sitting at $80,000, once you account for after-tax income, and the cost of yearly rent, if one were able to save 15% of your remaining income in a year ($5,900) it would still take about 7-10 years to save up for the down payment.
That’s why it is so aggravating when we see city councillors around the region standing on soapboxes and purposely frustrating the approvals process for desperately needed homes. Metro Vancouver is dynamic, and the needs of the region are ever evolving, but one constant across the board seems to be the need for more homes. It’s not to say that all municipalities are dropping the ball, the City of Surrey is quickly building new homes and will likely overtake Vancouver in the next 20 years as the heart of the region. The impact of increased homebuilding on prices in Surrey is easy to see when compared to other cities in the region. Most politicians run on a platform geared towards young families, yet when some enter office, they seem to forget who helped them get there. We need more municipalities in Metro Vancouver to get on board with the understanding that more homes are desperately needed as our region grows.
If we don’t see increased home construction of all types, I fear slowly but surely, a hollowing out of our region. Young families will continue to find there is no place for them to get ahead here. When you pair the pressures of an expensive region like Metro Vancouver with the current uncertainty surrounding COVID-19, the idea of many young families hitting the milestone of homeownership any time soon is unrealistic. Most of our parents bought their first home in their mid-twenties, but now we are seeing these crucial milestones be pushed further and further down the road for our generation.
