Bidding war prices renter out of Kelowna basement suite
It's hard enough to find anywhere to rent in the Okanagan, let alone an affordable rental, but Jolene Chernoff never anticipated the reason she missed on her latest opportunity — a bidding war with another tenant.
She tried to view a two-bedroom basement suite in Kelowna, listed at $1,400 per month, but her appointment was cancelled after another renter offered $1,800 monthly.
She said rental prices in the Okanagan are already “astronomical” without being driven even higher by other renters.
“Now I’m wondering, ‘do I offer more money?" she said. "Do we start doing that?’”
Relative to the local market, Chernoff felt like the basement suite listed for $1,400, which was newly renovated, was set at a reasonable rate. But she said it did not seem worth $1,800 a month – that’s nearly $5,000 more per year.
READ MORE: Kelowna 5th most expensive city in Canada to rent an apartment
Chernoff has been looking for somewhere else to live for the last six months and she doesn’t feel like she’s being too picky.
“My expectations are very low, I want working appliances and a clean home,” she said.
She realizes the person who outbid her may have been facing desperate circumstances, but she was “extremely disappointed” to get a message explaining what happened.
“If everyone starts doing this, people are just going to end up living in their car,” she said.
Chernoff is understanding of the property manager who accepted the higher rate. But she’s frustrated with the other renter – since they could afford to pay at least $1,800 per month in rent, she wonders why they weren’t shopping for more expensive apartments, rather than overpaying for a place that could have gone to a lower-income earner.
She’s been looking for apartments everywhere between Kelowna and Osoyoos and responds to ads within hours of them being posted. One property manager told her he was overwhelmed by applications and no longer accepting any more – just 15 hours after the ad was a posted.
Two personal factors are further hindering Chernoff’s search – she has a dog and is in the process of rebuilding her credit score.
Chernoff said she’s been employed full time and paying rent reliably for the past five years.
“But landlords won’t rent to me because my credit sucks, and finding a place to rent with a dog is nearly impossible.”
READ MORE: iN PHOTOS: What $1,500 in rent gets you in Kamloops and the Okanagan
Beyond anecdotes like Chernoff's experience, it's easy to find data to substantiate the fact that rental prices are rapidly increasing throughout the Okanagan and Kamloops.
Zumper, a website for connecting renters with landlords, showed the price of two bedroom apartments in Kelowna rose 24.6% from 2020 to 2021.
Earlier this year, Kelowna City Council was told the average rental unit cost $1,255 in the fall of 2020.
If an average single-income earner in the Central Okanagan manages to find a deal at $807 per month, they are still spending 30% of their income on rent, according to a report from the Regional District of Central Okanagan released in January.
Towards the beginning of 2021, the Canada Mortgage and Housing Corporation released data showing vacancy rates dropping throughout the Thompson-Okanagan between 2019 and 2020. At 2.1% Kelowna had the highest vacancy rate in the region while Penticton had the lowest at 0.8%.
But despite the heavy demand for affordable apartments, bidding wars don’t appear to be very common, according to Karen Barclay, who’s been an admin on the Penticton and area house/apartment rentals Facebook group for the past seven years. She said 90% of the listings are too expensive for half the population and that people usually only chime in to make negative comments.
“I do see a lot of complaining and negative comments where I have to intervene,” Barclay said. “Obviously in this group we have to show respect but I see where people are coming from. Two-bedroom apartments are listed in the $2,000-range plus utilities.”
Local rental prices seemed reasonable to Barclay when she first created the group in 2014. And although prices naturally rise over time, she said since the beginning of the pandemic, rates have been increasing “way quicker than they used to… I feel as if we all blinked and suddenly prices jumped, like a major jump.”
READ MORE: Looking for an apartment in Penticton? Don't be picky
She suspects the steep price climb is partially a result of not having enough rentals available to support the city’s growing population.
“It feels like winning the lottery if you find a rental that is affordable in Penticton,” she said.
Barclay can relate to those struggling to find a new home, having moved four times over the past seven years.
“I just hope that some miracle happens and rents and financial means become more easy to access and find.”
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