shelter

Rate Your Landlord

- Adam Clare

ai image of a banker building a house

Landlords run a business that profits off a basic human need: shelter. As a result of the basic power imbalance between those who can own multiple homes and those who can’t even afford one the whole landlord tenet relationship is prone to exploitation. The power imbalance is furthered by landlord groups that lobby for less protection for humans seeking shelter and informal landlord groups that share tips on how to exploit renters. To give renters a leg up a new website call Rate the Landlord allows for tenets to rate and comment on landlords so that fellow renters can make educated decisions about who they will give money for their shelter to.

Rate the Landlord was created as a tool for tenants to stay informed about housing the same way we stay informed about every other business, through crowd-sourced reviews.

We know that tenants are often in the dark when it comes to renting with a new landlord. This conflicts with the standards we hold for every other business and service where reviews allow the consumer to make an informed decision based on reports of quality and conduct.

Something as important as housing shouldn’t be an exception. Reviewing landlords alongside other businesses will make for a more transparent marketplace. By sharing rental experiences, tenants can help others avoid situations of negligence or mistreatment and find landlords who will uphold best practices and adhere to their local legislation.

Share your experiences, read the reviews, and help us keep one another safe, informed, and empowered.

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Off Grid Living for a Decade

- Adam Clare

The idea of living off the grid may sound impossible or like a pipe dream, but it is possible and cost efficient. A couple have been living off the grid for over a decade in their earth ship that looks and feels like a normal house. The neat stuff they installed includes a grey water collection and watering system, solar panels, and passive ventilation. Its’s a neat project that shows what’s possible,

Kristina is a structural engineer who designed and helped build this off-grid passive solar home with solar panels, solar hot water heaters, rainwater collection, a composting toilet, and a greywater garden. It’s a pretty impressive and functional Earthship inspired home and she lives here with her partner Matt in Colorado.

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How Neighbourhoods Are Fighting Climate Change

- Adam Clare

Neighbourhoods in Canada are trying to change the world by focussing on their own street. Across the country there are streets of houses proving that a transition from using fossil fuels to heat and power a home is possible in a country that loves to subsidize the oil and gas industry. And yes, going green saves money too.

The Pocket Change Project provides not only an example of how to convert your neighbourhood but information on how to do it. It may seem like a daunting task to go for fully electric in a place that guzzles gas for homes, but it’s doable and with the guides from Pocket Change it’s easy.

If you’re fortunate enough to own a home then you should you do your part and cut out gas.

When it comes to reducing household emissions, Dowsett is clear-eyed about where he thinks the responsibility lies.

“We who are the affluent ones are the ones who create an outsized carbon problem; people who are less affluent do not,” he said. “I think it’s very disingenuous of us to try and impose austerity on people who are not the problem. We are the problem. We need to change,” he said, before adding with a laugh, “rant over.”

Other Pocket residents echo this sentiment. “I believe that people who are privileged enough have a responsibility to do this,” said Lori Zucchiatti O’Neill. “A lot of people can’t afford to do this, but we can afford to do this. So it’s like, full steam ahead.”

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The Engineering of a Passive Off the Grid House

- Adam Clare

A sustainable home doesn’t need to be off the gird, but for some people interested in sustainability they reach a logical conclusion that off the gird makes sense. Of course, that means not being part of the electric grid and, for some, not even part of a public water system for potable water and sewage. How does one go about creating such a home? Check out the video above for what’s needed to create an efficient off the gird place to live.

Kristina is a structural engineer who designed and helped build this off-grid passive solar home with solar panels, solar hot water heaters, rainwater collection, a composting toilet, and a greywater garden. It’s a pretty impressive and functional Earthship inspired home and she lives here with her partner Matt in Colorado.

You can follow and find out more about Kristina and Matt’s off-grid lifestyle here:
https://www.youtube.com/@ClarityOffGrid
https://www.sustainablehomeresource.com/
https://www.sustainablehomeresource.c…

Big Bank in Canada Wants Socialized Housing

- Adam Clare

ai image of a banker building a house

The housing crisis in Canada has been decades of policy failures in the making arguably starting in the 90s when the federal government stopped building housing for people. Now, the housing crisis has grown to the point where one of Canada’s largest banks is calling for socialized housing to be built again. This means building house for people who are so priced out of the market that renting is hard for them due to the downward pressures from wealthy home buyers.The bank also calls for other measures to be taken, as with most things, there isn’t one simple solution.

There is a case to critically consider next-best approach(es) to non-market housing across the country. There are many learnings to be leveraged from crowding private capital into affordable housing and there is still much more to be done in that ‘middle market’. This is essential but insufficient. The largely scathing OAG report on basic access to housing suggests we have neither adequate governance frameworks nor the tools at present to address the magnitude of the challenges at the acute end of the housing continuum.
Canada needs a more ambitious, urgent and well-resourced strategy to expand its social housing infrastructure. Aims to double the stock of social housing across the country could be a start. This would bring Canada just in line with OECD (and G7) averages, but well- below some European and Nordic markets. There is no particular magic behind this number: bringing the stock to 1.3 mn dwellings would not fully close gaps. But it signals far more ambition than the 150 k incremental units targeted under the National Housing Strategy with the bulk of its efforts focused on keeping the current count whole.

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