Not only are 24% fewer bungalows being built than before, but the price of those on the market is exploding to the point where some are predicting the end of the suburbs as we know it.
“It’s the decline of the single-family home. Young people will probably no longer be able to access the family home, even in the suburbs,” said Paul Cardinal, director of the economic department of the Association of Construction and Housing Professionals of Quebec (APCHQ).
Photo d’archives
Paul Cardinal. Director of the APCHQ
“When we talk regarding the decline of the detached house, it’s in terms of new construction. We will build fewer and fewer,” he adds.
In April, the foundations of 719 individual houses were laid, it is a drop of 24% which was felt in September and which has lasted for eight months.
“However, for prices in the resale market, it will be the opposite. The growing scarcity of single-family homes will continue to drive up the price at a good pace,” said Paul Cardinal, of the APCHQ.
“All the big cities now want to curb single-family homes in favor of collective housing,” he observes.
For Charles Brant, director of the Market Analysis Service, at the Professional Association of Real Estate Brokers of Quebec (APCIQ), the phenomenon has increased with the pandemic.
sellers market
From one day to the next, Quebecers wanted to have some breathing space and sellers who already had the big end of the stick found themselves with ever more tempting offers on the table.
“There are many buyers for few sellers in this niche, especially in the suburbs”, analyzes Charles Brant.
“The price gap between a single-family home in Montreal and in the suburbs is narrowing. The price increases are phenomenal. On the North Shore, we saw an increase of 21% compared to last year, while in Montreal, it was only 6%, ”he illustrates.
Due to the lack of land and restrictive zoning, entrepreneurs are forced to build residences on ever smaller spaces, observes Guillaume Labrie, president of Construction Labrie.
“When they can, they pair up even on extremely small lots. The cities accept almost anything to have the most taxes possible, ”he underlines.
“We sometimes see houses that are built less than a meter from each other. It makes no sense,” he concludes.
- In the first quarter of the year, the median price of a single-family home jumped 22% to $415,444 in Quebec, according to the APCIQ.
He was ready to lower his price for a family
Photo Francis Halin
Dany Fillion, 44, sold his single-family home in Saint-Basile-le-Grand following falling in love with another larger residence in the same city.
A resident of Saint-Basile-le-Grand who has just sold the house in which he raised his three children was ready to lower the selling price by $15,000 to give a young family the chance to buy it.
“It broke my heart to see pregnant ladies or young families, a little desperate because they would like to settle in the suburbs. We were ready to compromise with the sale price,” says Dany Fillion, 44.
“We paid her a little over $200,000. We have just sold it for nearly 600,000 dollars ten years later”, underlines the man, who comes out of the whirlwind of visits.
Two weeks ago, the patent analyst from La Vallée-du-Richelieu county sold his house to buy a more spacious one.
“Every year, we renovated the house. We always had a renovation project,” explains the professional who has patiently built up his heritage.
Questionable ethics
Plunged headfirst into the crazy real estate market, Dany Fillion says that some agents he met on his way had questionable ethics.
“I would tend to say that sometimes honesty is not a uniformly widespread value among agents,” he drops.
Fortunately for him and his wife, it was finally a young couple with a child who bought their residence filled with memories.
“We sell expensive, but we buy expensive. I would tell young buyers to find something that may be less up to date and renovate it quietly,” explains Dany Fillion.
“The advantage with the younger generation is that there are plenty of YouTube videos. You can easily pick up a certain know-how, which was not the case in the 1990s,” he concludes.
Fewer single-family homes built in most major cities in Quebec
An evolution towards domination of “plexes”
Quebec bungalows from the last century are razed in favor of multi-residential dwellings that house more families than before on these large lots sold at exorbitant prices.
Photo Francis Halin
Bungalows like this one on the South Shore of Montreal are being demolished to make way for plexes. They occupy much less floor space, which means that their construction densifies the sector.
“That’s the trend. We replace the houses with 10,000 square feet of land to maximize them because the infrastructure is present and we are close to services,” explains David Brassard, President of BBC Group, which has its head office in Mont- Saint-Hilaire, in Montérégie.
“It is in the common interest to densify these small urban centers and to bring in a larger clientele for local businesses,” he says.
Au Journalthe boss of the SME with regarding forty employees, whose turnover exceeds $20 million, is categorical: there are fewer and fewer projects that sell the dream of the famous bungalow.
“It’s sometimes more complex to build when it’s denser. The detached single-family home was still the easiest to build, but we adapt to the demand,” continues the construction contractor.
Pe resistance
According to David Brassard, agricultural dezoning in the greater Montreal area and the densification targets imposed have an impact on the type of construction chosen, but there is a lot of resistance to change.
In recent months, the scarcity of land has caused prices to explode. Residential areas have become denser with semi-detached, townhouses, townhouses and plexes rather than bungalows.
“There is often the phenomenon of ‘not in my backyard. Density, yes, but not with us”. We face that often,” said Mr. Brassard.
“It goes in the direction of sustainable development, even if it is not always perceived as that,” he adds.
According to David Brassard, what are called TOD areas, or real estate development around a public transit station, are highly valued, but often come up once morest opposition from citizens.
“Municipal councils are very cautious, very populist. They are very attentive to the dissatisfied citizen,” he maintains.
As a result, single-family neighborhoods are moving outside the Metropolitan Community of Montreal (CMM) and eroding the once shunned landscape.
Mont-Saint-Hilaire, Granby, Marieville… cities are developing at breakneck speed, boosted by the arrival of teleworkers, who have stormed into these communities, which are often farthest from major urban centres.
“It resurfaces elsewhere,” he concludes.
- More than 634 new homes were built in smaller urban centers last month, up 8%, according to the Association of Construction and Housing Professionals of Quebec.