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Issue link: http://digital.canadawide.com/i/1441359
be solved when the olds finally moved out of their mini-palaces. To use their words: "Older gen- erations' housing stock could accommodate an additional 207,240 persons by 2051 due to turnover to younger, larger households. One quarter of To- ronto's forecasted population growth to 2051 could be accom- modated in the existing hous- ing stock due to turnover." That came on the heels of a U.S. study from the previous summer, "The Great Senior Short-Sale," by University of Arizona professor Arthur Nel- son, which predicted that "mil- lions of American homes could become unsellable—or could be sold at significant losses to their senior-citizen owners— between now and 2040." To be fair, Nelson's study, which got a fair amount of at- tention, doesn't say that will happen everywhere. Bigger, thriving cities—like Toronto and Vancouver, presumably— will do better. Smaller, more out-of-the way towns will not. But many Canadian re- searchers and analysts and housing studiers are not at all convinced this is ever going to be the answer to the country's housing crunch anywhere. They say the boomers are holding on to their houses in ways not seen in previous gen- erations. They're living longer, they're in better health, they still have the energy to do some upkeep—and that's especially true of those who own homes, a group that's likely to be bet- ter off socio-economically. Many homeowners appear to be financially comfortable enough that they don't need to downsize to fund their retire- ment. And now they have the spectre of COVID's impact on retirement and long-term-care homes spurring them on. As Linda Power says, "I'm only leaving this house in a box." Yes, some are moving into smaller places. Very slowly. Though that's not as big a fac- tor as death, the researchers tell me. Even death is not a game changer. Yes, people start dying at a more advanced clip from 65 on, but it's not fast enough to make any real dent in the housing market. Again, those who die earlier are more likely to be poorer seniors, the ones already living in small apartments that they rent or own, not the ones with the three empty bedrooms. (Lest anyone think I'm a smart- assed millennial being insensi- tive to the olds, I am the olds, as are many of my friends.) As a result, the projection for how many 55- to 64-year- old householders in the Metro Vancouver region will down- size from single-family houses to something smaller in the next five years is…1,888 from a total of about 77,100 now, ac- cording to number-crunching done by Andy Ramlo, VP of intelligence at Rennie Group. That's barely over 1 percent in five years, in a region that grows at the very least by 5 percent in that same period. Overall in Canada, Ramlo says, the percentage of people who maintain homes actually increases for the 65-to-74s. People don't really start leav- ing their homes until after 85. Drilling into Vancouver proper, the expensive epicen- tre: the 55s-to-64s who owned houses in Vancouver back in 2006 accounted for 38 percent of that age group. Ten years later, the 2016 census found that 35 percent of them (now 65-74) were still single-family homeowners, as per analysis by Jens von Bergmann, the math whiz who helps Vancou- ver understand itself on a reg- ular basis through mapping of census numbers. That's just what is happen- ing with current residents. There's also immigration to factor in. That's a big driver in Canada, more so than in the States. The U.S., population 330 million, accepts about a million immigrants a year. Canada, population almost 10 times smaller at 38 million, has accepted about 300,000 on average in recent years. So even as boomers in Can- ada do slowly, slowly downsize and/or die, there's a much bigger and steadier wave of newcomers arriving and look- ing for homes, besides all the millennials who will be hunt- ing for years to get themselves into something bigger than a shoebox. All of which suggests that we can't count on the boom- ers disappearing as a solution for anything. But at least our kids and grandkids will have nice houses to visit for family gatherings. • ( the informer ) ISTOCK; NETFLIX (TOP LEFT) T E R M S + C ON DI T ION S Our contribution to the language of business and beyond lu•lu le•mon that big idea of yours that went nowhere u•ni•corn bread the payoff from a blockbuster IPO pas•sive- ag•gres•sive house the City of Vancouver's building permit process stalk ex•change when coworkers bond over TV thriller You an•ti-wax•ers holdouts from the men's grooming revolution 20 BCBUSINESS JANUARY/FEBRUARY 2022