I came across these survey results in a guest column by Wendy Waters in Connect CRE Canada called, "What Will Attract Young Professionals to a New Rental-Apartment Building?" If I ignore the typo in "strong cel [sic] signal" and just look at the results, many of them are intuitively obvious. The vast majority of renters believe that in-suite laundry is essential, and it's the number-one want in this survey.
Pet-friendly is also not surprising given that pets are going to outnumber kids in most new purpose-built rental apartment buildings. And, of course, people want connectivity. I interpret high-speed wireless and strong cell signal throughout the building to specifically mean the common areas. Presumably, 100% of people want internet and cell signal within their apartments.
At the same time, there are some other interesting results. For example, 55% of respondents (in this segment) said that a private balcony is essential and 97% said it was either essential or a nice-to-have.
There's a common debate in developer boardrooms about whether private outdoor spaces are essential to sell or lease an apartment and there are certainly rental developers who abstain from them altogether. But tenants seem to like them a lot, at least according to this survey. And a "nice-to-have" is still something that helps with leasing.
People also seem to want a king-size bed. Whether they'd be willing to pay for the additional space is a separate matter. There is always an affordability and willingness to pay dimension to surveys. I mean, who wouldn't like more? But a larger primary bedroom appears on this list and, right now, there's a growing sense in the market that buyers and tenants want livable spaces over things like podcasting rooms and ski simulators.
From a Maslow's hierarchy of needs perspective, this seems to make sense. People want their physiological needs — such as a comfy bed — solved first, and then they'll worry about finding self-actualization in their new podcast.
Cover photo by Lotus Design N Print on Unsplash
Chart via Connect Canada CRE
Paris has residential rent controls. They were put in place on a test basis starting on July 1, 2019 and, broadly speaking, they limit what rents can be charged on a per-square-metre basis according to the neighbourhood, rental type (unfurnished or furnished), number of bedrooms, and the period of construction.
Since then, there have been various studies examining their effects. Here's a recent one by Apur. In this report, the authors conclude that over the six-year period, the controls moderated rents by -5% compared to where they would have been had they been unfettered. Importantly, they also conclude that the rent control policies have had no meaningful impact on the city's rental supply.
However, it's important to point out that "rental supply" means the supply of rental homes in buildings already built. The report does not talk about new construction. And as I understand it, the rent controls are more flexible for new construction. There's also a complément de loyer (rent supplement) that developers and landlords can charge for new builds that are energy efficient and offer exceptional comfort or amenities.
Regardless of the specifics, it's interesting to think about rent controls in a city like Paris. The central part of the region, Paris proper, is already built out and constructs very little new housing each year. By some estimates, the net amount (factoring in existing units being demolished) is only something like 1,500 to 2,000 units annually. And if you consider new market-rate units, it's an even smaller number.
From a policy standpoint, this presumably means you're a lot less concerned about new housing supply — at least in the central neighbourhoods — and more concerned about the overall affordability of the existing supply.
Cover photo by Salomé Watel on Unsplash
I sat next to a software developer at my friend's wedding a few weeks ago, and I figured I would ask him the obvious question: "What percentage of the code that you write today is now being done through AI?" At first he was reticent to answer, but eventually he told me that it's, like, the majority. That sounded right.
I then decided to pull out my phone and force upon him something that I've been vibe coding. I'm sure he found this boring, but his response was interesting nonetheless. He said, "This is the future of software. It is going to be both highly personalized and built by actual users. And because of this, it's going to be better software." In other words, accountants will build what they need, photographers will build what they need, and real estate developers will build what they need.
What I showed him was Propeur.com, a residential property management platform tailored toward small Ontario landlords that I have been building for my own purposes and as a tool that Globizen can use for its infill rental projects. It's still early days and there are bugs to work out, but here's what you can do so far:
Add your rental properties and receive a Monday morning email with a summary of what happened over the last week and what's on the horizon.
Manage tenants and rental units, including move-in and move-out dates, and all of the critical dates surrounding rental increases.
Automatically track current debt balances and maturity dates.
Store all relevant property documents, and have them automatically labeled and categorized in the appropriate folders.
Create a public property profile for both on-market and off-market units (here's an example).
Sync bank accounts and categorize expenses by property and unit.
Export transactions to a CSV, filtered by property, date, and revenue/expense category.
Log maintenance requests and automatically email them out to a contractor or maintenance person (the next step will likely be some kind of tenant portal).
Export tax reports at the end of the year.
Again, it's still very much a preliminary beta release and there are certainly bugs. But already, I find myself using it almost daily. If you're a small landlord in Ontario and would like to give it a spin, you can sign up here. I'd love to get your feedback on the platform. And if it's something you find useful, please feel free to drop me a line and I'll buy you a coffee.
Cover photo by Alexander Andrews on Unsplash