A Rational Plan for Affordable Housing. Louis Shalako.

No basement required...

 

Louis Shalako

The federal government has promised a series of 'pre-approved' housing designs, meant to speed up home-building and address the shortfall in available housing stock.

One has to cringe at the thoughts of what they will come up with, and how that will be received by developers, home builders, and the bougies, who are presently occupied with houses six times the size and footprint of these homes, pictured on a quiet block of the 'tree streets', here in Sarnia, Ontario.

I think it’s safe to say the old 1 ½ story ‘wartime’ housing will not be much of a contender in this plan. Three bedrooms, one bath, and an unfinished basement, in a development of essentially identical housing, would be a bit of a hard sell, but then perhaps we have become spoiled over the years…ah, but what if they were brand, spanking new houses, going for $299,000.00? What if the feds split the down payment with you? What if your income was taken into account in the mortgage agreement?

What if someone had an actual, serious plan, ladies and gentlemen…???

What then.

What then, eh? Many of the kids I grew up with lived in this neighbourhood. Some of these have no basement. Some of them are two bedroom, as far as I know it is presently illegal to build a one-bedroom home. You would have to go to city council, and ask for a variance from the bylaws. Resale value would be impacted by the fact it is only one bedroom. The bank don’t want to mortgage it and no one wants to build it.

The dreaded, 1 1/2 story 'wartime' housing.

It is my opinion that you could build six to ten of these little two-bedroom houses in the same time it takes to build one massive bougie house along Blackwell Road, for comparison. Building large numbers of million-dollar houses is not going to solve the housing crisis, which does not involve the upper and middle classes, only lower-income Canadians. And apartment living isn't for everyone, the fact is my rent and other costs could cover a small mortgage assuming some rational, long-term and low-interest scenario.

Assuming some rational down payment, affordable payments, low municipal taxes, efficient heating and cooling, low maintenance costs, low insurance costs, and low transportation costs in the so-called ‘walkable city’. That is, admittedly, a lot to ask.

In Sarnia, basements are made to flood. Who needs it? A ground-floor utility room is just as good and probably cheaper to build. In terms of objections, there would have to be some federal and provincial subsidy, just to get the thing started. A certain class of person is already howling at how unfair that is—to them, mostly. Why, I do not know. They just like to bitch about every little thing, this among the most fortunate, most privileged bunch of people on the face of this planet. It really is unseemly, ladies and gentlemen, but that is indeed who they are.

As far as infrastructure hookups, the same bit of street that might serve one bougie home, can now serve two or three of the smaller homes. All of whom pay municipal property taxes, in the aggregate, contributing more to the tax base than one really big home, and when it comes to infrastructure, we are constantly being told that density is good—right up until someone goes to build it, and then it doesn’t happen. In Sarnia, we presently have about 3,200 unit approvals, and project after project seems to fall by the wayside. It amounts to one new apartment build on London Road at Afton Drive, and one currently under construction at the old Sarnia General Hospital site. Approvals mean nothing, what counts is shovels in the ground—and workers to build it. Capitalists don’t really build anything, ladies and gentlemen. Their purpose is to accumulate capital. What good is it, if you don’t do anything with it?

Yet big, upscale houses are going up all over the place, in the north end, along Lakeshore Road, where the houses weren’t exactly working class to begin with, and in Point Edward, where what was working-class and middle-class housing once stood, buildings are being knocked down and replaced by behemoths three to four times the size. Every second farmhouse is being knocked down and being replaced with upscale housing.

The big, bougie houses are not going to solve the housing crisis.

Location, location, location, right? It ain’t exactly cheap to knock down what was a viable house, and then put up another one of any size and configuration. The bet here, is that the investment will pay off. In other words, the folks building these have no interest in an affordable marketplace, one that would benefit a greater number of Canadians. But to put that in perspective, you’re investing three or four hundred grand, just to get a building lot in a desirable location. Clearly, this kind of market and consumer behaviour is not going to solve the housing crisis.

My apartment is about 740 square feet. As a standalone building, I wouldn’t want to make it a whole hell of a lot bigger. The galley type kitchen is small, so is the bathroom. If we took it up to 900 square feet, we could address these issues simply by bumping out extensions on what would be the front elevation of the building. Simply put, instead of a rectangle, we end up with a thick ‘L’ shape and some revision of the interior floor plan.

The younger crowd buy a house, all of a sudden, they’re tearing it apart. They’re renovating the kitchen, putting in another bathroom, a hot tub on a new deck out back, they’re installing all new windows, doors and siding. They’re also throwing a roof on the place and maybe putting in a new furnace. They have the income to support such projects, and the energy and optimism required to complete such projects.

It’s an investment, I agree. It’s also a pain in the ass to live in a never-ending construction zone. With the aging of the population, some of us just want a nice, small, clean, well-built and efficient house where, essentially, we don’t have to fix or renovate a single damned thing. It doesn’t have to be anything real special.

Just a nice, clean, simple little house—I’ll bet they can’t do it.

It’s too hard.

Their minds just don’t work that way, ladies and gentlemen.

Cabana style living, at an affordable price.

 

END

 

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