By paNOW

P.A. had highest rental turnover rate in province: report

Nov 30, 2017 | 6:00 PM

Prince Albert had the highest rate of rental turnovers in Saskatchewan over the past year, according to a recently-released report by the Canadian Mortgage and Housing Corporation (CMHC).

The report, which studied rental rates between October of 2016 and October of 2017, found 67.5 per cent of all private apartments in Prince Albert turned over during that period. The next-highest turnover rate was recorded in Swift Current, where 41.3 per cent of all apartments turned over. The average rate for all of the urban centres in the province was 37.5 per cent, and Yorkton saw the lowest turnover rate with just 32.2 per cent.

Despite the city’s high turnover rate, Prince Albert was found to have a below-average number of vacant apartments. The report found six per cent of private apartments in P.A. were empty, while the provincial vacancy rate was pegged at 9.3 per cent. Estevan had the highest rate of vacant apartments in Saskatchewan, with 25.3 per cent unoccupied.

Goodson Mwale, CMHC’s senior marketing analyst for Saskatchewan, told paNOW the region’s high unemployment rate could help explain the number of rental turnovers.

“The unemployment rate for Prince Albert and the northern Saskatchewan region is still around seven per cent this year. It’s still quite high,” he said. “Economic conditions do play a key role.”

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While Prince Albert is still affected, Mwale said several regions of the province have already started to rebound from Saskatchewan’s recent economic downturn. As economic conditions improve across the province, Mwale said Prince Albert should see vacancy and turnover rates declining as well.

“For Prince Albert the key will be the economic backdrop,” he said. “When you start to see that unemployment come down and you start to see employment growth beginning to recover, then you will see a recovery in rental demand as well.”

The turnover rate presented in the report did not include subsidized housing, he said, and only considered data from the open rental market. Mwale also cautioned against drawing any sweeping economic inferences from the Prince Albert numbers alone, as the sample size is much smaller when compared to other urban centres or to the province as a whole.

Landlord Association optimistic

Despite Prince Albert’s high turnover rate, Chanda Lockhart, executive officer with the Saskatchewan Landlord Association, said other areas of the report are quite positive. Although Prince Albert’s vacancy rate increased slightly over the past 12 months, Lockhart said vacancy has been trending downward for several years and remains well below the provincial average.

“The general rental market in Prince Albert is stabilizing,” she said. “Vacancy has definitely decreased [over the long-term].”

Lockhart said she expects vacancy will continue to decrease in the city, which opens up the possibility for rent to increase slightly. Many landlords struggled during the economic downturn, she said, and a drop in vacancy means they will have the ability to recoup some of their losses.

Overall, Lockhart said she’s quite optimistic for the future of the Prince Albert rental market.

“It’s on an upward motion, which is awesome,” she said. “Vacancies and availability and rentals are kind of like a roller coaster, and it’s nice to see that it’s on an upward motion because it means things are going well.”

Taylor.macpherson@jpbg.ca

On Twitter: @TMacPhersonNews