No region is now immune to the housing crisis. Taking stock of the situation on Thursday in Montreal, the Front d’action populaire en réaménagement urbain (FRAPRU) reported 1,667 households without housing, without a lease or looking for housing, in all regions of Quebec.
“The housing shortage is as widespread as it has ever been across the province. All of Quebec’s municipalities now have a shortage of rental housing,” said FRAPRU spokesperson Véronique Laflamme.
“We always want to know which region is the worst, but the situation is deteriorating everywhere in Quebec.”
All of the province’s major cities have a vacancy rate of 1.5% or less, while the balance is at 3%. Several of them even have rates below 1%. This is the case, in particular, for Granby (0.3%), Trois-Rivières (0.4%), Drummondville (0.5%), Rimouski (0.6%) and Québec (0.9%), while Gatineau is exactly at 1%.
Living in a campsite or in your vehicle
Of the 1,667 households without housing as of Thursday, a number that will undoubtedly increase in the coming days, 379 are temporarily housed by municipalities – in hotels in most cases – or with relatives. The others are in various precarious situations, including camping or in their vehicles.
Moreover, this unprecedented figure comes at a time when there has been a significant drop in the number of moves compared to 2018. In other words, even if fewer households are moving, the number of those in difficulty is increasing.
Véronique Laflamme recounted as an example that the pressure is so strong that we even saw a landlord evict tenants to accommodate his son who had himself been evicted and could no longer find housing.
Although FRAPRU welcomes the expansion of assistance services funded by the Quebec government, it is asking that they be funded and in effect year-round since the crisis now extends beyond July 1. “We must ensure that we continue to offer emergency assistance services throughout Quebec year-round to prevent tenants from falling through the cracks. Moving is happening less and less on July 1,” the spokesperson argues.
Invisible roaming
Many households are approaching what she calls invisible homelessness.
“When you’re camping or on a family member’s couch, and the vacancy rate in your area is 0%, you’re not far from homelessness, and that’s why we insist so much on the importance of having year-round services, rehousing people, and especially that we act now to have an alternative because the housing that people need won’t appear by magic in many cases.”
She notes in passing that some municipalities have refused to join the temporary accommodation program, considering this intervention too expensive. “Temporary accommodation is increasingly long. Municipalities are reimbursed 50% of the expenses related to storage, moving and accommodation. Some do not have the financial leeway required.”
Severe shortage of social housing
The organization also severely criticizes the Legault government for its inaction in terms of building social housing. It urges Quebec to present an action plan on housing, noting that this action plan has been expected since spring 2022 and deplores the fact that no new consultation on this subject has taken place since 2020.
According to FRAPRU, some 160,000 social housing units would need to be built within 15 years so that they represent 20% of the rental stock, a minimum in the current context of overbidding.
Véronique Laflamme points out that Ottawa plans to invest billions in social housing and calls on Quebec to jump at the chance, if only by simple accounting calculation.
“Not acting now, not funding social housing, is expensive. Homelessness costs more than social housing in health, in social services. The consequences are long-lasting on children who are living through the crisis. Women who are victims of domestic violence. We have known the consequences of the lack of social housing for years. And now, we know that it contributes to increasing the ranks of people experiencing homelessness.
“For us, it’s a penny-pinching economy not to invest in it.”
The organization goes further, calling for a ban on short-term accommodation such as Airbnb, a necessary measure in a context of crisis that would allow at least 30,000 homes to be put back on the market.