Montreal buying up 700 units for affordable housing in CDN-NDG

Montreal is planning to acquire roughly 30 apartment buildings in Côte-des-Neiges–Notre-Dame-de-Grâce.

The more than 700 housing units are expected to cost $103 million.

“I am honestly really, really happy about this announcement today because what we are doing basically is to literally save like 700 people from the risk of having to leave their apartment,” said Gracia Kasoki Katahwa, the borough mayor of CDN-NDG.

The city says the goal is to help protect vulnerable households and affordable housing, calling the housing needs “very high.”

“What we’re doing with this is to how can we do everything we can at the city level to secure what is already affordable, to prevent more people to fall in the cracks and maybe ends up in the streets,” said Montreal Mayor Valérie Plante.

“There’s already people there. That’s why we say we want to prevent having more people going on that list of looking for social or affordable housing. This is why it’s so important.”

Plante said the city acquired the buildings from the market in hopes they can prevent landlords from taking over and not providing affordable units, calling it a chance they couldn’t pass up.

“A lot of people listening to us will say, ‘OK, I’m safe. I’m good. Nobody will throw me out of my apartment.’ And I think that right now so many Montrealers are scared of that.”

The project will be managed by Montreal’s municipal housing office, the OMHM, which will conduct health checks of the buildings in the coming months to determine renovation priorities.

City officials are hoping to bring Montreal closer to its goal of achieving 20 per cent non-market housing by 2050.

‘How are the rents going to be set?’

Margaret van Nooten, of social housing non-profit Project Genesis, says she is thrilled with the announcement, though she remains cautious regarding how the city is defining affordable housing.

“That does make me wonder what kind of what is the rent really going to be.” van Nooten wondered. “How are the rents going to be set? Because if one says we’re protecting the rent from speculation, that doesn’t necessarily mean very much.

“What is affordable to a middle-class person is not affordable to somebody who’s getting… a single person gets about $800 on welfare.”

van Nooten said the borough has historically had issues with housing and it’s damaging when she hears stories of families losing their home..

She and Plante agree that a proper solution to this problem is needed and providing protection for Montrealers in the fight against the housing crisis and preventing homelessness is crucial.

“I would like to see people being protected, in fact, from eviction,” said van Nooten. “I would like to see people being protected from homelessness. And I think that having rent geared to income is a really good way to do that.”

In what condition are the buildings?

The municipal Opposition’s housing critic called the announcement “good news” for residents of Côte-des-Neiges–Notre-Dame-de-Grâce, but raised questions about the condition of the buildings.

“There will certainly be corrections to be made to the units,” Julien Hénault-Ratelle with Ensemble Montréal. “Projet Montréal is an expert at keeping acquired buildings without providing the necessary funding to maintain and renovate them.”

Hénault-Ratelle adds he doubts the OMHM will be able to maintain the 700 units “while it is struggling to do so for its current 20,000 units, which are largely in poor or very poor condition.”