As someone who has a mortgage, I’m not up to date on the rental market in my neighbourhood. Next door, they’ve been building a 40-story rental-only apartment building for the last several years. It’s almost done and the people that own the building have started to advertise and look for renters. On a whim, I contacted them to figure out what the rental prices were. I was shocked to discover rentals start at $1,443 a month for a studio apartment about 350 sq. feet in size. That’s for an apartment on the 7th floor and it’s an extra $5 a month for each floor you go up. That’s double what I pay for my mortgage each month. The building is open to anyone but they’re trying hard to advertise the units to students. How does a student afford $1443 a month?
On another whim, I decided to see how much my particular apartment layout rents for now. The last time I checked, which might have been more than a year ago, the same apartment in my building went for around $1,500 a month. I’ve now seen listings for $1,700 a month. Shocking.
I’d have nowhere to live but if I rented out my apartment, I’d have someone pay off my mortgage way faster. I mentioned this to my parents and my Mom suggested I could move back home again. That was a sweet offer but I’d have to make a lot more money off my apartment before I’d consider doing that.