Going big on very small spaces
Demand is there for compact homes that are well designed and flexible
Irecently sat down with a young friend to talk about housing. He is a successful entrepreneur in his late 20s in the online industry. He grew up in Vancouver and is part of that creative class that planners and demographers hail as the driving force for economic development in our cities. He wanted to talk about some ideas for housing that most would consider unconventional, if not radical.
His ideas are about a form of housing that doesn’t exist in Vancouver, but is emerging in other cities globally where the creative class is attracted because of both lifestyle and career opportunities.
I am not going to reveal the particular ideas he shared with me because he may decide to try to pioneer them here, and I don’t want to undermine his competitive advantage.
His housing concepts respond to the different set of values that millennials and largely, members of this creative class share. Materialism, possessions, long- term commitments and suburban living are an anathema to them. They are looking for flexibility, sustainable and healthy living, the inner- city vibe, and opportunities to share and connect socially, while embracing the latest that technology offers for online social communications. They want a kind of housing that allows them to live their lives in a way that aligns with their values.
While housing affordability is a big concern with this demographic and social cohort, so is the location of housing, its size, its design and its form of tenure.
Many are searching for a kind of housing that doesn’t exist in Vancouver. They want smaller housing, well- designed flexible space, common amenities beyond the fitness room or meeting space, different forms of ownership or occupancy and green and convenience- enhancing features.
Despite the huge growth we’ve seen in residential development in Metro Vancouver, the only real shift we’ve seen in housing choice over the last generation or two has been the one that has seen multi- family developments that offer strata ownership replace detached single- family homes.
While condominium and rental apartments have become the dominant housing form in our inner cities, the constrained land base in Metro Vancouver still makes this form of housing relatively expensive when compared to average incomes.
One way of making this housing form more affordable is to make it more efficient in terms of size. In downsizing apartments, much more attention needs to be paid to the finer details of the design of space in suites and to designing common space and shared amenities.
Vancouver’s Reliance Properties has been a pioneer in this approach to apartment developments in what has been coined “micro lofts” with their two leading- edge projects: one in Vancouver’s Downtown Eastside and another in Victoria’s downtown. Its restoration of the historic Burns Block on East Hastings Street created micro lofts for rent where the floor space for suites ranged from 229 to 265 square feet, with rents ranging from $ 800 to $ 1,100.
Much attention was paid to designing almost every square inch of the suites to be functional and flexible to meet the lifestyle needs of the people living in them. Despite the success of this award- winning project, Vancouver’s new Local Area Plan for the Downtown Eastside doesn’t permit suites smaller than 280 square feet. Minimum suite sizes in Vancouver overall are regulated at 298 square feet.
These arbitrary rules regulating size seem to defy both what has been successful and what many people are looking for.
Reliance Properties is in the process of completing another heritage building revitalization in downtown Victoria, a city that doesn’t regulate minimum suite sizes. It pre- sold all the 122 micro- loft condominium homes in this building in just over a month. Suites 250 square feet in size sold in this building for under $ 110,000.
Reliance Properties wants to go one step further with this concept of micro- living by offering locationefficient inner- city living in downtown Vancouver in a new highrise building with small footprint suites designed with a range of built- in features that enhance functional living and with a number of different amenities and common spaces throughout the building that promote community and social interaction.
The project it has been talking with city planners about would offer 370 micro lofts ranging from studio units at 288 square feet to two- bedroom apartment homes averaging 582 square feet.
Reliance Properties’ President Jon Stovell says he’s not sure whether the city will support this plan, despite the fact that it responds to the city’s housing affordability objectives.
Innovation in housing types doesn’t just respond to affordability challenges; it also attracts the kinds of people planners identify as the economic driving force in cities. It’s time to let buyers and renters choose the housing that offers lifestyles that align with their values.