the state of canadian accommodation is not strong

[amw]

One of the things i find most detestable about both the US and Canada is that in countries with SO FUCKING MUCH empty space, accommodation is SO FUCKING EXPENSIVE. It's disgraceful. I have been desperately looking around for some way to live for cheap now that i am back in BC without a friend to couchsurf at, and it just doesn't exist

Comments

[amw]

Yeah, the anti money laundering thing is a big deal in Canada too. It's only gotten worse with things like requiring two-factor authentication for everything... which of course is a big pain in the ass when you are traveling and your SIM card doesn't roam in the country you are in, or even when you aren't traveling and you lost your phone.

The absurd thing is they told me they could send a credit card to the branch, but they couldn't send a debit card to the branch. Why? Who knows why. They could also issue me a completely different debit card with a different number (which would require me to change all of my online payments everywhere), but i couldn't keep the same number unless they could send it to the address that was already on file. Or to a hotel in another country, if i called from another country and told them i lost my card. It's just absurd, like something out of the movie Brazil.

Also, yes. Rooming/boarding houses should absolutely still be a thing. I actually stayed in one in Toronto overnight - one of the local universities has a dormitory building where they rent out the dorm rooms to travelers as a hotel when students aren't at school. It's a shared bathroom and kitchen, but you get a private room with a bed and a desk plus a hearty breakfast for around $100 per night in the middle of the city. So it's not like that kind of accommodation is illegal. I guess it's just not something that earns enough money for professional hoteliers/landlords to bother providing it.

Imo a huge part of the problem in the US and Canada is zoning restrictions that discourage dense development, which is linked to the cultural mindset that landowners are somehow entitled to a property value that will always increase and never decrease. So people who got their single family home refuse to allow anything else built in their neighborhood, so their land becomes more valuable to them in dollar terms, but the land never actually provides more value to the community because there will never be more than one family living there. If zoning was more free, then businesses and multi-family accommodations could go up organically in the places where it would make the most financial sense to do it, neighborhoods would likely become more walkable, and there should be more affordable housing overall because there isn't a perverse incentive for the homeowning class to keep the supply down.

Although, i am not an economist, so this is just my suspicion. It just seems really ridiculous, though, that in countries like the US and Canada where there really is a vast amount of available land compared to other countries, we still are somehow stuck unable to provide an affordable place to stay for many people who actually live here.

[coercedbynutmeg]

I happened to think of another issue in the US, but not sure if it's a thing in Canada. In the US, a lot of the low-budget hotels, particularly in seasonal areas, enter into contracts with the .gov to house immigrants/asylum seekers or sometimes guest workers, so that greatly reduces the number of $45-a-night spots that are available. This also happens with FEMA in the aftermath of certain natural disasters like tornadoes or hurricanes. It's probably preferable to get $50 a night guaranteed from the .gov than to risk empty rooms, for example, particularly for basic, low-end accommodation.

[amw]

That might have an impact, but if there are still other people beyond those sponsored by the government who need a $45 room, then the problem is still a lack of supply. It doesn't really matter whether it's the government or individuals paying the bill - either way there aren't enough rooms available at that price for the demand. And that goes for long-term accommodation as well as short-term accommodation. Housing is just extremely unaffordable here right now.

Here's the best statistic i found in a quick search to show the problem: https://data.oecd.org/price/housing-prices.htm If you show price-to-income ratio, Canada is amongst the most expensive countries in the OECD (only Portugal, Luxembourg and New Zealand above it).