Daily insights for city builders, delivered every morning at 6 AM ET. I’m Brandon Donnelly — a Toronto-based real estate developer and founder of Globizen. I’ve been writing here since 2013.
It is based on recent population estimates from Statistics Canada, and what it is saying is that the Greater Toronto Area grew by 233,000 people during the 12 months ending July 1, 2023. If you include Hamilton, this number increases to 246,000. And if you include the entire Greater Golden Horseshoe, it increases to 340,000.
This is significantly more population growth compared to any of the six preceding years. And assuming this 2021 population estimate of about 9.8 million people is more or less correct, it represents an almost 3.5% growth rate. That’s remarkable. It’s also happening at a time when housing starts are declining.
The Greater Toronto and Hamilton Area is expected to see 6,821 new rental homes completed this year. This is a “multi-decade high”, according to Urbanation’s latest rental report. Indeed, you need to go back to the 1970s to get rental supply figures of this magnitude.
A big part of this has to do with the fact that we are now taxing rental housing less. Toward the end of last year, the federal government removed their portion of the HST on new rental housing and, then in November, the province of Ontario followed with theirs.
But there’s another reason that many developers are now looking to purpose-built rentals: fewer people are buying new condominiums. And if you can’t presell condos, well then you’re going to need to find another path forward for your land.
However, flipping over to rental is not necessarily a panacea. The margins are generally razor thin (+/- 50 bps). It requires more and different capital (typically). And you need to believe in some fairly non-consensus assumptions (high rent growth, low cap rates, etc.).
It’ll be interesting to see how many developers are able to successfully flip over to rental and how sustained this rental supply number will be.
This week, Urbanation released its condominium market update for Q1-2024. And I’d like to point out two data points. Firstly, across the Greater Toronto & Hamilton Area (GTHA), there were 1,461 new condominium sales for the quarter.
This is the lowest quarterly total since Q1-2009 (the global financial crisis) and the second lowest total since the mid-1990s. (Remember when we spoke about right now being the toughest market since the early 90s?)
Secondly, during this same time period, 2,361 new condominiums began construction across the region. This represents a 52% annual decrease. So all in all, fewer people are buying new homes and fewer new homes are starting construction.
What is obvious is that the market is slow right now. What is not obvious is what happens next. It’s unknowable. There’s risk. My gut is that the market will come back more slowly than many people are expecting, or perhaps hoping. There’s inventory that needs to work its way through the system first.
But ultimately it will come back. Toronto is one of the greatest cities in the world and there remains a need for more homes. Which is why I continue to believe that, if you are in the market for a new one, now is arguably a wonderful time. You get to buy when most others aren’t.
Today was the official launch of Corktown Condos. (In case you missed it, I wrote about Corktown last month, over here.) So what does this actually mean? What it means is that we got a small group of 500+ agents and brokers together to tell them about the project. We talked about our love of Hamilton and provided an overview of the project’s amenities, suite pricing, deposit structures, and so on. Everyone who attended now also has access to our broker portal, where all of this information is stored.
However, no actual purchase agreements were signed today. That’s for later. The first signing event will take place on Saturday, May 27th starting at 12PM, at 30 St. Clair Avenue West, Suite 103, in Toronto. So if you’re interested in Corktown, I would encourage you to attend on this date. Feel free to also reach out to our sales team if you have any questions (sales@corktown.condos). The people you want to connect with are Shannon Glas, Daniella Commisso, and/or Hansen Chu. Hopefully I’ll see you there next weekend!
Earlier this week, I shared this image of Corktown Condos on my Instagram. It represents the first phase of Slate’s two-phase project in Hamilton, and I’m excited to announce that we’ll be launching sales this spring (both in Hamilton and in Toronto).
We love Hamilton. It has walkability, transit, a wonderful stock of old buildings, and a dynamic and growing cultural scene. In other words, it has all of the characteristics that we look for when it comes to new projects. And here, our approach to city building is exactly analogous to what we did in Toronto at Yonge & St. Clair.
Those of you who are familiar with our work will know that Slate owns 8 office buildings in midtown, including all four corners of the Yonge & St. Clair intersection. And that we have spent the last decade investing in these buildings, investing in the public realm, investing in public art, and working to support businesses in the area. Then in 2021, we launched sales on a landmark condominium tower called One Delisle that is now under construction.
Here in Hamilton, we are similarly investing in economic development and in housing. Last year, it was announced that we acquired approximately 800 acres of industrial land and buildings on Hamilton’s waterfront. This site alone has the potential to create up to 23,000 new jobs across the region and inject up to $3.8 billion into Ontario’s economy. It will likely also take some time and be measured in decades.
We prefer to think of ourselves as city builders. And that means taking a long-term view and thinking about the broader city — not just about our individual projects. So for us, Corktown is part of a much larger and longer-term commitment to the City of Hamilton. And we couldn’t be more excited to share it with all of you in the coming weeks.
Stay tuned. And if you’d like to register for Corktown, you can do that over here.
Our team is looking to partner with local Hamilton, Ontario-based artists and creatives as part of a new project that we’re working on for next year. So this post is intended to be a call to artists. If you’re based in Hamilton and doing great work, we would love to hear from you. Please drop me an email (brandon@slateam.com).
In my mind, art and culture is a fundamental ingredient in Hamilton’s ongoing renaissance. Each and every time I’m in the city, I feel like I meet someone who is an artist. And there are so many great examples that we can point to.
Take Scott Martin (aka Burnt Toast). Scott is a Hamilton-based illustrator and co-creator of the fantastically popular Doodles NFT collection. I don’t have one in my wallet, but I can tell you that I want one. The current starting price for a Doodle is nearly US$9k. But as an alternative, you could also just go to downtown Hamilton and look at one of Scott’s public murals.
Go Hamilton. Please show us what else you are creating.
A few days ago I tweeted this chart out (from Statistics Canada):
It is a list of the densest downtowns in Canada (people per square kilometer). But to be more precise, it is a list of the densest primary downtowns for each census metropolitan area.
In the case of Toronto, for instance, it considers downtown Toronto, but it does not consider downtown Mississauga, downtown Brampton, or any other “downtowns” across the CMA. And in the case of Vancouver, it ignores important centers such as Burnaby.
Many were quick to point this out on Twitter and it is a fair comment. Our cities are often more polycentric than a chart like this might make it seem.
The other thing to consider is that these density numbers are dependent on what you assume as the boundary for each downtown. For downtown Vancouver it’s a fair bit easier because it is a peninsula surrounded by water.
But for downtown Toronto, it’s more nebulous. Where do you draw the line? In this case, Statistics Canada is using the same downtown boundary as what’s in our Official Plan, but that happens to include the lower-density University of Toronto lands. So are we comparing apples to apples?
Today, Slate Asset Management announced its latest condominium project: Corktown. Named after its neighborhood, Corktown is located in downtown Hamilton just south of the GO Centre station.
Since then, the design has evolved to include a tower on the southeast corner of the block (pictured above) and a mid-rise building along John Street South. This site is also now fully zoned.
So it’s go time. Phase one, called Corktown East, will launch this summer and condo pre-registration is live as of today. To register, head over here.
This is an incredible house in Hamilton, Ontario by Toronto-based architecture practice Partisans. The central idea is clearly its folding roof, which dips down to accommodate a set of stairs that lead to the roof of the house. At the same time, the sloping roof creates a wave-like enclosure for the indoor/outdoor pool that sits below it.
Partisans is, in my opinion, one of the most creative firms practicing in the city today. This house is a good example of that. I also admire their ability to go deep into materials and construction methods, which is something you need to do when you design forms like the ones you’re seeing here. For more photos and information, check out this Dezeen article about the project.
This deserves a blog post. Below is a great tweet by Jason Thorne. Jason leads the department of planning and economic development at the City of Hamilton, where, full disclosure, we have a development project.
I have said this many times before on the blog, but the challenge with most “community engagement” is that cities typically hear from the people who disagree. Those voices are then taken as representative.
My gut tells me that we need to make it easier for people to agree. We need to reduce the barriers. Some will take the time to write a thoughtful letter. But most won’t.
