EDMONTON – There is more than one million people living the greater Edmonton area, but only 56,000 apartments for rent. Not only can it be hard to find a decent place to rent in the capital region, it can also be expensive.
Edmonton’s newest apartment building and the latest one in quite a while, Mayfair Village South on 100 Avenue and 109 Street, has 237 sleek, contemporary suites that are almost ready to move into.
“We’ve just really briefly kind of started putting out our advertising and what we have found is the calls have kept coming in,” says Sherry Schluessel with Procura, a property development and real estate management company. “And we’ve actually had to get more people involved answering the calls and taking applications.”
Because the complex is an attainable housing project, designed for people making less than $42,000 a year, rents will be ten percent below average rates.
In the next several months, ground is expected to break on Mayfair Village North, while will be a regular-rental market building.
Meanwhile, for a normal two-bedroom apartment in Edmonton, the average rent for a two-bedroom apartment is just over $1,000 dollars. The last forecast from the Canada Mortgage and Housing Corporation showed the apartment vacancy rent in the city at 3.3 percent. In downtown it’s 3.2 percent, while south of the river it’s even lower with 1.3 percent in Mill Woods, and 1.2 percent in southwest Edmonton.
“I’m a little nervous about some of the numbers,” says Rob Gilbertson of the Edmonton Economic Development Corporation. “From what we’re hearing in the industry, it’s probably even tighter than the numbers indicate.”
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The EEDC is especially concerned about the numbers because of the challenges associated with attracting qualified people here for work.
“We’re looking at tradespeople, we’re looking at professional people. So, once you finally do convince them that this would be a great place to move to, if they come here, and they can’t find a place to live, we’re going to have a real problem,” says Gilbertson. “What some people think is a relatively simple challenge is actually fairly complicated.”
Schluessel suggests anyone looking for a place shouldn’t be complacent.
“I definately wouldn’t be leaving it. I’d be out there educating myself and looking for the location that you need, and start now.”
With files from Vinesh Pratap, Global News
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