GTAAonline Magazine December 2022

PRESIDENT’S Message

Thanks for attending our annual dinner gala. It was great to see everyone at our industry’s first large indoor gathering after more than two years of restrictions and various stages of uneasiness. From all the hugging and smiles it was by all counts a huge success.

It largely happens with the generosity of our dinner sponsors. This combined with more than 500 attendees that comfortably mingled in our new spacious Parkview Manor venue made for a spectacular time.

We didn’t hold anything back – live band to greet our guests, an open bar reception with tons of food, a delicious full course meal that people are still talking about, massive prizes and a postdinner silent disco.

During dinner our Charitable Foundation presented over $100K to local organizations that do tremendous work in our communities.

Technology is helpful, but you can’t beat being back in-person. Add up all the pieces and you get the best dinner, ever!

Lots has happened over the past few months. Municipal elections across Ontario were held in October. Toronto Council took a slight left turn – who thought that was possible? That combined with a strong Mayor, courtesy of new powers bestowed by Queen’s Park will add a new dynamic to a variety of housing related decisions at City Hall. This is brand new, uncharted territory.

In early November we received a favourable decision in our application against Toronto’s by-laws which essentially made apartment owners financially responsible for social services and housing displaced tenants should an event cause a significant portion of the building to be unoccupiable. It’s good to end the year with a big win. The City offered to not appeal the decision in exchange for GTAA dropping our cost recovery application (loser pays the winner’s costs) … we took it. Toronto is not appealing, and will send us $20,000 to cover administrative fees. This matter is closed.

Combine this with our successful push to hold development charges for purpose-built rental projects with a zero percent increase – while condominiums would see a 46% increase over two years – made for another good news story in the later half of 2022.

As we turn our calendars to the new year, there will be opportunities and challenges along our path. As we work together we’ll be ready for both.

Best wishes to you, your families and your teams. I look forward to seeing you more, in-person, through 2023.

GTAAOnline is published monthly by RHB Inc. on behalf of the Greater Toronto Apartment Association (GTAA) and is distributed online through controlled circulation to the GTAA membership.

Please contact the Publisher for advertising dates and rates. Opinions expressed are those of the authors and do not necessarily reflect the views and opinions of the GTAA Board or management. GTAA accepts no liability for information contained herein.

Opinions expressed in articles are those of the authors and do not necessarily reflect the views and opinions of the GTAA Board or management. GTAA and RHB Inc. accept no liability for information contained herein. All rights reserved. Contents may not be reproduced without the written permission from the publisher.

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OWNERS & PROPERTY MANAGERS

Waterbank Construction Ltd.

Abraham Waisbrod (416) 879-7781 aw@waterbankconstruction.com

8IGHT Asset Management

Elaine Leung (647) 236-7581 elaine@coinhenge.com

Suppliers

Building Supplies / Services HVAC/Mechanical/Plumbing/

Construction/Repair/ Emergency Services

Arguson MultiCon Inc.

Paul Clarkson (905) 232-2139 paul@argusonmulticon.ca https://argusonmulticon.ca/

Mitsubishi Electric Sales Canada Inc.

Steve Cornelius (905) 475-7728 E. 3253 Steve.Cornelius@mesca.ca

BlueBits Technologies Inc. Mariana Yusypchuk (416) 228-8111 marianna@bluebits.ca www.bluebits.ca www.mitsubishielectric.ca/en

Wight Tree Service Inc.

John Wight (289) 231-9274 info@wtreecare.ca https://wighttreeservice.com/

City Wide Facility Solutions Toronto West Enrique Suarez (416) 488-8090 esuarez@gocitywide.com https://torontowest.gocitywide.com/

Brickstone Construction Ltd. Aarti Vohra (647) 864-1942 aarti@waterbankconstruction.com https://brickstone-construction.com/

Sense Engineering

Mark Salerno (647) 226-2570 msalerno@senseengineering.com https://senseengineering.com/

ALBERTA

EDMONTON

ONTARIO

TORONTO

EDMONTON

CALGARY

QUEBEC

Toronto Renoviction Policy

Creating a Framework to Protect Affordable and Mid-range Rental Homes and Deter Renovictions

The Executive Director, Housing Secretariat’s report was discussed at the July 5 meeting of the Planning and Housing Committee, then approved by City Council on July 19, 2022.

The City’s Housing Charter: Opportunity for All, also states that, “the City will take action to prevent arbitrary eviction, homelessness and other threats to human security and dignity, ensuring that City policies and programs are designed to avoid residents from being made homeless.”

The staff reported stated:

As a result of various factors impacting Toronto’s housing market (including low vacancy rates, lack of purpose-built affordable rental homes, wages that have not kept pace with the increased cost of living and the financialization of housing) many low-income and marginalized residents, including those from equity-deserving groups, are struggling to find and maintain safe, secure and affordable homes. These conditions have resulted in increased rates of evictions.

In particular, there has been a growing trend of “renovictions” in Toronto whereby a landlord illegitimately evicts a tenant by alleging that they need vacant possession of a residential unit to undertake renovations or repairs. Evictions, including renovictions, result in the displacement of tenants, housing instability, increased rates of homelessness and the permanent loss of affordable and mid-range rental homes.

Staff were directed to explore and recommend a Renoviction Policy. Here are some excerpts:

The City of Toronto’s Renoviction Policy (the “Policy”) sets out a framework to preserve Affordable and Mid-range rental housing stock across the city. It is acknowledged that this Policy and companion future by-law cannot prevent the loss of Affordable and Mid-range rental housing and stop Renovictions, as this is within the jurisdiction of the Province. Specifically, the City of Toronto cannot make a determination about when a residential tenancy agreement may or may not end under the Residential Tenancies Act. All determinations of whether a residential tenancy agreement may or may not end due to renovation or repairs are governed by the Residential Tenancies Act.

However, this Policy and future by-law will leverage the City’s authorities under the City of Toronto Act (COTA) to deter the practice of Renovictions to support the health, social and economic wellbeing of the City and its people.

Successful implementation of this Policy and companion by-law will require a coordinated approach across various City divisions and additional dedicated resources in order to achieve the intended outcomes listed below.

Policy details via a new by-law:

Require all Landlords to obtain a building permit prior to taking steps to obtain vacant possession of a Rental Unit to carry out a repair or renovation of the Rental Unit, except where a building permit cannot be obtained without vacant possession of the unit.

Require all Landlords to provide a copy of the City’s Tenant Eviction Prevention Handbook to Tenants, containing standard information, upon: • signing of a lease for a Rental Unit; and • taking steps to obtain vacant possession of a Rental Unit for the purpose of repairs or renovation.

Require landlords of rental properties to post and maintain a notice in a prominent and visible place within the property, and deliver a letter to the Rental Units notifying tenants when a building permit application has been made to the City of Toronto accompanied by an accurate description of the proposed work. The notice would also provide tenants with guidance on how to obtain further information from the City of Toronto on tenant rights.

Take appropriate enforcement action if non-compliance with the by-law is observed.

It further notes that:

The primary intended outcome of the policy is voluntary compliance by landlords, and staff will use an education-first approach. Where the City finds evidence of noncompliance that is not resolved through education, progressive and appropriate enforcement action may be taken. As the City does not have oversight of all landlords, does not currently have mechanisms to monitor compliance, and still needs to address gaps in data to understand the full scale of the renovictions issue, investigations into any by-law violations will initially be done on a reactive, complaint basis.

Most of the media coverage involved recommendations 4-15 which was a laundry list of requests mostly to the province to amend the RTA, some to the federal government, or both. The key requests to the province were:

Amend RTA

• require landlords of residential units to be responsible for finding temporary accommodation for their tenants if they need to leave a unit so that it can be repaired or renovated, and the tenants intend to move back post-repair/renovation;

• provide the same rights afforded to tenants in buildings with five (5) or more units to those in buildings with less than five (5) units;

• re-introduce rent control to cover units occupied after November 15, 2018;

• amend AGI rules to make expenditures that are necessary to address non-compliance with municipal property standards/municipal orders around health, safety or maintenance standards to be ineligible for AGIs;

City Council request the Government of Ontario to introduce vacancy control legislation which ties rents to residential units rather than tenants.

City Council request the Government of Ontario to create a centralized data system and registry to:

a) register all rental properties in Toronto including purpose-built rentals, secondary suites, condominiums in rental tenure, and multi-tenant homes;

b) include the owners of rental properties, including details of beneficial ownership if the property is held in trust for another entity;

c) make owners of rental properties, including corporations and their beneficial owners, publically accessible and searchable; and d) make the data available to the public.

City Council request the federal government, through the Minister of Housing and Diversity and Inclusion and in collaboration with the City of Toronto, to advance commitments outlined in the Minister’s mandate letter to address renovictions and expedite the development and/or implementation of policies, programs and investments including to:

• prevent renovictions;

• amend to the Income Tax Act to require landlords to disclose in their tax filings the rent they receive pre- and post-renovation and to pay the taxing authority a proportional surtax if the increase in rent is excessive;

• introduce an anti-flipping tax on residential properties, requiring properties to be held for at least 12 months;

• impose a temporary ban on foreign buyers of non-recreational residential property in the Canadian housing market so that housing does not sit vacant and unavailable to Canadians;

• review and reform the tax treatment of Real Estate Investment Trusts;

• develop policies to curb excessive profits in investment properties while protecting small independent landlords;

• increase the down payment requirements for investment properties;

• respond to housing price fluctuations

Annual General Meeting –October 26, 2022

Welcome Back!

The GTAA’s 2022 Annual General Meeting (our first in-person AGM since 2019) was very well attended. Members arrived early to hear our Chair’s annual summary and the Treasurer’s report. Our digital Annual Report was electronically distributed and our audited financial statements were mailed to each member, well in advance. The meeting commenced on time, ran smoothly and was informative.

Six nominations were received by the advertised closing at 3 PM on September 21, 2022 for Director positions on our Board.

CONGRATULATIONS to the following GTAA Members who have joined our Board of Directors for a three-year term (November 2022 – October 2025):

• Kris Boyce – Signet Group

• Bert C. Grant – Lawrence Construction Co. Limited

• Laura Holland – BentallGreenOak

• Annette M. Mincer – Direct Properties Inc.

• Justin Taylor – Greenrock Real Estate Advisors

• Martin Tovey – Minto Properties

At the first Board of Directors meeting of the new term held on November 3, 2022, the Executive Committee members, Standing Committee Chairs, and Charitable Foundation Board were selected.

Trusted Advisors

Philip Sarvinis | Bill Gladu | Jeremy Horst | Michael Pond | Duncan Rowe Jack Albert | Beau Gaudreau | James Cooper | Michael Park | Tim Van Zwol

Board of Directors November 2022

– 2nd Vice-Chair

– Past-Chair

– Secretary

– 1st Vice-Chair

– Treasurer

2022 – October 2023

Executive Committee

Laura Holland – Chair

Justin Taylor – 1st Vice Chair

Cora Armstrong – 2nd Vice Chair

Yehudi Hendler – Treasurer

Paul Smith – Secretary

George Espinola – Past Chair

Perry Fryers

Gloria Salomon Martin Tovey

Charitable Foundation Board of Directors

Margaret Herd (Park Property Management) – Chair

Peter Altobelli (Yardi Systems)

Perry Fryers (WJ Properties)

Yehudi Hendler (Y.L. Hendler Ltd.)

Laura Holland (Bentall GreenOak)

Justin Taylor (Greenrock Realty Advisors)

Standing Committees

The Greater Toronto Apartment Association has five standing committees that deal with a variety of matters that are of great importance to the apartment industry and to our members. Members join these committees to participate more actively in the decision making of the GTAA. Each committee has a specific role and being part of it comes with some commitment. Attending and participating at meetings and voting on issues are the main responsibilities.

Education & Training Committee

Cora Armstrong – Chair

Members’ Services & Fundraising Committee

Laura Holland - Chair

Policy, Administration & Finance Committee

Yehudi Hendler – Chair

Political Action & Municipal Liaison

Laura Holland & George Espinola – Co-Chairs

Utilities, Environment & Communications Committee

Perry Fryers – Chair

If you are interested in learning more and/or joining a committee, please contact us via info@gtaaonline.com

Annual Dinner

This year’s Annual General Meeting was immediately followed by a full capacity cocktail reception and multi-course dinner at Parkview Manor. We grew out of the former venue and were delighted with the new spacious facility.

Guests were greeted in a long hall by our team of volunteer members and a live band and vocalist. The instruments boomed and the singer crooned throughout as guest registered and mingled during the pre-dinner portion of the evening. Food and drink were plentiful.

Another sold out event with 530 members and their guests, to finally catch-up with industry friends.

We started the evening with a toast to our industry’s achievements during the pandemic. We also recognized that we lost friends and family along the way. And then there was lots of hugging. Welcome back!

Chair Laura Holland provided a summary of our past year, highlighting our achievements and noting some issues that will soon arise. She noted that as we approached the municipal election in mid-October, there was yet another attempt to reintroduce the colour-coding rating system. It failed again. Laura advised the crowd that we recently had our hearing at the Ontario Superior Court of Justice – to argue that apartment owners should not be on the hook to pay for social service and rehousing costs for a catastrophic event.

Regarding new construction, Laura highlighted our achievements in having purpose-built rental exempt from Inclusionary Zoning requirements across the GTA. Additionally, new rental projects would see a 0% increase in development charges in Toronto for the next five year, while new condominiums would see a 46% increase phased-in over two years. And that we would work towards getting bigger discounts and incentives.

She highlighted the accomplishments of our entire industry for nearly three years of unforeseen circumstances while navigating through the unknown health challenges. Together we did a tremendous job taking care of our residents while many were often ordered to stay home in their apartments. She thanked everyone for their commitment and hard work.

Charitable Foundation Donates $140,000 at Annual Dinner

Our Charitable Foundation celebrated our 17th year by presenting $105,000 to seven worthy organizations who each work tirelessly to help those in our community who need some assistance.

Our Charitable Foundation Board is pleased to recognize Greenrock Real Estate Advisors, Park Property Management and Yardi Systems as our Platinum Sponsors; Lawrence Construction and WJ Properties as our Gold Sponsor; Preston Group, and Homestead Land Holdings as Silver Sponsors of our Foundation.

Margaret Herd, Chair of the GTAA Charitable Foundation presented $15,000 cheques to the seven partnering agencies at our annual dinner. These dedicated community-based organizations are making a tremendous difference in the lives of the homeless and hard to house. We are proud to support and assist them in assisting others.

Each of the following grant recipients received $15,000 from GTAA’s Charitable Foundation:

Our annual Scholarship Awards were presented before the academic year started for four very qualified and deserving residents in our buildings. Alan, Iyesha, Princess and Winzel were delighted, as were their families, to each receive $5,000. GTAA’s scholarship award is $4,000 and each of building owners provided an additional $1,000 to help their winning resident. Well done!

“Yardi Investment Manager has been a critical element of Baceline’s ability to grow our investor base and scale our investor relations department. The level of comprehensive, dynamic investment data brings confidence to our investors and credibility to our business.”

BACELINE INVESTMENTS

Lindsey Reevie Partner

The Foundation Board sincerely thanks everyone for your support and attendance at our Golf Tournament and Chair’s Luncheon. Our events and direct donations enable us to make these contributions.

Our Foundation can make these significant investments in the community due to the ongoing support of seven main corporate sponsors. Pictured below representing the Platinum ($15,000), Gold ($10,000) and Silver ($5,000) Sponsors generously donate directly to the Foundation each year, are: Vera Tahiraj (Homestead Land Holdings), Bert C Grant (Lawrence Construction Company), Barbara Rodgers (Greenrock Real Estate Advisors), Perry Fryers (WJ Properties), Margaret Herd (Park Property Management), Gloria Salomon (Preston Living), and Wayne Tuck (Yardi Canada)

PLATINUM SPONSOR

GOLD SPONSOR

SILVER SPONSOR

The Charitable Foundation was also able to sponsor 150 children living in Toronto’s family shelter system during the pandemic. While the kids were unable to gather for a fun filled day, the Family Residences staff with the children and families came up with creative ways to enjoy being at home.

You can donate personally and corporately to the Charitable Foundation so that our industry may continue and even expand on our annual efforts to make a positive difference. Please contact GTAA (info@gtaaonline.com) to request the donation form.

GTAA Charitable Foundation’s Major Sponsors:

Millennium Members represent a very important part of our association’s support from our supplier members. At our annual dinner we acknowledged them for their outstanding dedication with a token of our appreciation and a moment on stage.

We wish to further acknowledge the contribution to the GTAA of the following Millennium Members:

Rob Herman Sam Grossman Award of Excellence

The Greater Toronto Apartment Association’s Founding Chair Sam Grossman was a leader in the property management industry. Sam played a major role in the development of the GTAA and encouraged all in the industry to participate in the association’s endeavours.

GTAA’s Executive Committee established the Sam Grossman Award of Excellence to recognize an individual in the property management industry that has made a significant contribution to their company, our industry and society.

Sam Grossman attended and introduced this year’s recipient – Rob Herman. Sam noted that he and Rob were part of the group that decided to create GTAA in 1998. He provided a retrospective look of the rental industry and how it has evolved over the years. They both served on the inaugural Board of Directors.

Rob has been a continuous Director on GTAA’s Board and has provided many decades of service. He recently sold his portfolio and management contracts and is now fully retired from the rental business. We wish him well and hope he enjoys many, many leisure years!

Industry action on the federal housing agenda

By John Dickie, President, CFAA

As reported in a previous issue, the main current political risk to rental housing providers in the GTAA and across Canada is the review of taxes on rental housing currently being conducted by the federal government. This article provides an update.

The key federal “promises”

Tenant advocates and “right to housing” advocates have significant influence with the current federal Liberal Government. Thanks to that influence and the current economic situation, the federal Liberals have made public, political commitments as follows:

“… the Minister of Finance is to work with the Minister of Housing and Diversity and Inclusion to deter “renovictions” and address housing affordability in Canada, including by:

Introducing amendments to the Income Tax Act to require landlords to disclose in their tax filings the rent they receive pre- and post-renovation and to pay a proportional surtax if the increase in rent is excessive; Reviewing possible reforms to the tax treatment of Real Estate Investment Trusts, the down payment requirements for investment properties, and policies to curb excessive profits [in rental housing].”

The NDP also has influence through the Supply and Confidence agreement to support the Liberal minority government. In a major press release, the federal NDP wrote: “The Liberals have to stop rewarding rich investors for buying up rental units, and then jacking up the rent. This … has to stop.”

How R2H underlies the complaints and thus the promises

Leilani Farha is a leading Canadian advocate for the right to housing (R2H). Her definition of R2H is the “right to live somewhere in peace, security and dignity”.

Ensuring that everyone can access adequate housing is primarily the responsibility of the three orders of government. Leilani Farha and other human rights activists also believe that all orders of government have the responsibility to regulate private sector actors to ensure the sector does not exclude people from their right to housing by terminating tenancies to demolish buildings to intensify the site they are located on, or terminating tenancies for non-payment of rent.

R2H underlies the objections to “renovictions” and “demovictions”. However, the rental industry believes that if tenants will not relocate voluntarily, they need to be evicted to enable low-rise housing to be replaced with more rental homes. Some “demovictions” are essential to provide more homes through more density, and to avoid giving the last few tenants the ability to extort unreasonable compensation from developers, before a site is cleared for a redevelopment.

Likewise, some renovictions may be needed to enable buildings to be renewed and upgraded, and to enable repairs to critical building elements which can only be accessed through rental units.

In a rental market with adequate supply, it is usually easy enough for existing tenants to move out because they can easily find alternate accommodation at similar rents to what they are paying. However, when rental demand is powered by high immigration, and the rental housing supply chain is gummed up as it is now, finding alternate accommodation is not easy, and the conflicts intensify.

That seems to be the underlying cause of the vocal advocacy for enforcement of the right to housing, and for the prevention of “renovictions” and “demovictions”.

Status of the activity and policy work

GTAA’s CEO, and leading GTAA members, are working with CFAA to state the views of the rental housing industry on the right to housing, and on what should be done to implement the right to housing. We want to make sure that the right to housing does not interfere unduly with the need to obtain vacant possession so that intensification can take place to provide the rental supply which is so desperately needed.

We also want to make sure the federal government does not change the federal tax rules, or other policies, to restrict rental housing. Such moves would damage the rental housing industry, and hurt the very people the housing advocates want to help.

GTAA is a member of CFAA, which represents the owners and managers of close to 1,500,000 rental homes across Canada through member associations and direct memberships.

CMHC launches - new multi-unit mortgage loan insurance product focused on affordability, accessibility, and climate compatibility

CMHC’s MLI Select product offers scaling flexibilities to encourage the preservation and creation of affordable, accessible and climate compatible units. Flexibilities include higher loan-to-value ratios, increased amortizations, lower debt coverage ratios, and reduced premiums.

Access reduced premiums and longer amortization periods based on your level of commitment to affordability, accessibility, and climate compatibility using MLI Select.

How the MLI Select point system works

MLI Select uses a point system to offer insurance incentives based on affordability, energy efficiency, and accessibility. Incentives are available for new construction and existing properties.

Eligible Loan Purposes

• Construction of residential housing

• Improvements on existing residential housing

• Purchase of residential housing

• Refinance loans for residential housing

• Purchase and conversion of non-residential buildings to residential use

Existing Properties and New Construction

• A property is considered existing at the earlier of (i) achieving 12 consecutive months of stabilizing effective gross income (EGI), or (ii) 24 months after first occupancy.

• Once a residential building is considered existing, it is always existing even if new units are added to the building.

• New Construction is anything that is not existing.

Property Type and Size

• New and existing affordable, energy efficient and/or accessible housing projects including: standard rental housing, single room occupancy (SRO), supportive housing and retirement homes. Student housing projects are only eligible to quality under energy efficiency and accessibility.

• Minimum project size of five units except retirement homes where a minimum of 50 units/ beds is required. Non-Residential Component Not to exceed 30% of gross floor area nor 30% of total lending value. Loan relating to nonresidential component must not exceed 75% of lending value of non-residential component.

• Criteria Borrowers can commit to any combination of the following social outcomes, though a minimum of 50 points is needed to qualify for MLI Select.

Affordability

This outcome is assessed based on the percentage of units within the project with rents equal to or below the established threshold for the subject market.

New construction:

• Level 1 (50 points) – Min. 10% of units at max. 30% of median renter income

• Level 2 (70 points) – Min. 15% of units at max. 30% of median renter income

• Level 3 (100 points) – Min. 25% of units at max. 30% of median renter income

Existing properties:

• Level 1 (50 points) – Min. 40% of units at max. 30% of median renter income

• Level 2 (70 points) – Min. 60% of units at max. 30% of median renter income

• Level 3 (100 points) – Min. 80% of units at max. 30% of median renter income

In all cases, the borrower must commit to maintain affordability for a minimum of 10 years from the date of first occupancy of the project. Affordability commitments of 20 or more years will be awarded an additional 30 points.

Energy Efficiency

This outcome is assessed based on the improved performance over the baseline, which depends on if the building is new or existing.

New construction:

• Level 1 (30 points) – Min. 20% better than NECB/NBC

• Level 2 (50 points) – Min. 25% better than NECB/NBC

• Level 3 (100 points) – Min. 40% better than NECB/NBC

Existing properties:

• Level 1 (30 points) – Min. 15% decrease over current baseline levels

• Level 2 (50 points) – Min. 25% decrease over current baseline levels

• Level 3 (100 points) – Min. 40% decrease over current baseline levels

Accessibility:

This outcome is assessed based on the level of accessibility and adaptable building design.

Level 1 (20 points):

• Min. 15% of the units are considered accessible in accordance with the CSA standard B651-18 or

• Min. 15% of units are universal design or

• The building receives Rick Hansen Foundation Accessibility Certification (60%-79% score)

Level 2 (30 points):

• Min. 15% of units are considered accessible in accordance with the CSA standard B651-18 and min. 85% of units are universal design or

• 100% of units are universal design or

• 100% of units are accessible in accordance with the CSA standard B651-18 or

• The building receives Rick Hansen Foundation Accessibility Certification Gold (score of 80% or better).

Product Timelines

Affordability criteria:

• Applies for the entire duration of the affordability period beginning at the date of first occupancy for new construction or major renovation, and the interest adjustment date for existing buildings. Documentation is required to support on going compliance throughout the affordability period.

Efficiency criteria and accessibility criteria:

• Where improvements or construction are undertaken prior to the request for loan insurance, documentation confirming achievement of the criteria is required as part of the loan insurance application. Work must have been completed within 12 months of the request.

• Where insured financing is used to undertake improvements or construction, documentation confirming achievement of the criteria is required within 60 days after the last advance.

• Where improvements are completed with the borrower’s own resources or non-insured financing, documentation confirming achievement of the criteria is required within 24 months of the last advance.

• Unlike the affordability criteria, the energy efficiency criteria and/or the accessibility criteria does not need to be demonstrated on an annual basis. Once achieved, the borrower’s commitment is considered fulfilled and there are no further requirements.

Maximum Loan-To-Value Ratio

• New construction: residential component up to 95% loan-to-cost; non-residential component up to 75% loan-to-cost.

• Existing properties: residential component up to 95% loan-to-value; non-residential component up to 75% loan-to-value.

Loan Advancing

New construction: the loan may be advanced up to 95% of costs during construction. Existing properties: the loan may be advanced up to 95% of value. The full loan is available once construction/improvement is complete.

The more committed you are to social and environmental outcomes, the better the incentives. You can choose to focus on a single area like affordability or combine commitments to increase your points and incentives.

Full product details can be found at www.cmhc.ca.

Fight inflation by improving energy efficiency

By Scott Bullock, Supervisor, Energy Solutions, Enbridge Gas

With limited budgets, competing priorities and aging building equipment, affordable multi-family housing providers are faced with a seemingly impossible challenge: doing more with less while maintaining a safe and comfortable home for their residents. As the cost of living continues to rise, energy efficiency is a proven solution to lower ongoing operating costs while improving resident comfort and reducing greenhouse gas emissions.

The Affordable Multi-Family Housing program provides up to $200,000 in incentives to help offset the upfront costs of energy-efficient improvements. This makes it easier to build a business case and get projects off the ground.

4 common energy efficiency projects to consider

1. Improve boiler efficiency

The older your boiler, the more likely it is to break down and lead to costly repairs over time. Avoid the added costs and hassle of breakdowns by upgrading to a high-efficiency boiler. The latest systems are much more efficient and feature precise controls that can optimize performance. The result? Greater energy efficiency and cost savings.

2. Add smart controls

A building automation system (BAS) gives you enhanced control over key energy systems, making it easy to lower costs and improve comfort automatically. A BAS leverages sensors to automatically adjust building performance and makes it easier to troubleshoot after-hours issues remotely.

3. Get FREE in-suite upgrades

As part of the Affordable Multi-Family Housing program, you could also receive free, professionally installed energy-saving upgrades in all eligible units, including low-flow showerheads, aerators and heat reflector panels.

One of the participating affordable multi-family buildings at 2600 Jane Street in North York, Toronto, installed heat reflector panels in 115 suites. This resulted in annual heating savings of 19.5 percent, an annual natural gas cost savings of $13,031 (based on $0.339 per cubic metre) and 38,440 cubic metres of energy saved per year.

4. Implement heat recovery

Energy wasted is money wasted. That’s why affordable multi-family housing providers are installing heat recovery ventilators (HRV). HRVs reduce energy costs by recovering the most energy possible from outgoing air to heat the incoming fresh outdoor air. This improves indoor air quality while reducing energy use.

Not sure where to find savings? Start with a detailed energy assessment. Schedule a free, no obligation consultation with an Enbridge Gas Energy Solutions Advisor to uncover your biggest savings opportunities or have a service provider perform an on-site energy assessment, with incentives up to $8,000 per building (up to $40,000 per housing provider).

Ready to save? Contact an Energy Solutions Advisor. To be eligible for the Affordable Multi-Family Housing program, you must be a social or municipal housing provider, shelter, co-op or eligible private market-rate multi-family building with low-income tenants. Buildings must be four storeys or higher. Contact an Enbridge Gas Energy Solutions Advisor at 1-866-844-9994 or energyservices@enbridge.com. Visit enbridgegas.com/affordable for program details, testimonials and more.

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