The healthy rate is 3% according to the CHMC
Muskoka’s vacancy rate was at 0.65% last year, as reported in an article by the Huntsville Forester, representing a continued downward trend in vacancies over the last few years.
According to the report, the vacancy rate in 2021 was 0.8% which was a big decrease from the 1.13% in 2020 and 1.2% in 2019. The Canada Housing and Mortgage Corporation (CHMC) said that a healthy vacancy rate would be 3%.
Lack of affordable housing
Out of 611 households that were on the rent-geared-to-income (RGI) housing waitlist in December 2022, 488 of them were waiting for a one-bedroom unit, 23% were senior citizens.
“There continues to be a significant lack of affordable housing in Muskoka, and high housing costs and supply shortages continue to negatively impact many residents’ ability to find affordable and appropriate housing,” the report stated.
Because of the lack of supply in housing, prices for homes have become unreachable for residents because the median employment income in Muskoka is 16% lower than the province at large.
“Many local businesses now struggle to attract employees due to a lack of affordable and attainable housing,” the report further read.
District chair Jeff Lehman expressed his belief that there must be more effort to resolve such issues.
“It is difficult to put a number on how many people out there are attempting to find housing in Muskoka and not finding it,” said Lehman.
“That’s beyond the capacity of publicly subsidized housing to solve. That’s a market problem we hope to influence with the task force’s activities and other efforts,” he added.
Muskoka’s HHP efforts
The district was able to fund and create 17 units with the use of local, provincial, and federal funding. However, the district’s target number of units was 30 units annually. The report explained that the district was not able to construct the needed number of units because of factors such as funding availability and the challenges brought by the real estate and construction markets.
The Muskoka Affordable Housing Initiatives Program (MAHIP) budget was increased by $1 million to $3.2 million in total - $12.7 million has been spent on funding programs for housing and homelessness.
