Little — and expensive — house on the prairie

Everything seems to be getting more expensive. Food, gas and housing prices are on the rise while paycheques are slow to keep pace. The CBC News series Priced Out explains why you're paying more at the register and how Canadians are coping with the high cost of everything.

Isaac Wall is making the most of the space he can afford.

With two bedrooms on his main floor and another in the basement, his rental home in Winkler, Man., is cramped for his family of 10, including eight children ranging in age from three to 14.

"It feels like you're in jail, but what could you do?" he said jokingly.

A Mennonite farmer from Paraguay, Wall moved his family to Manitoba last October, taking a job in a machine shop to be closer to family in Canada, where he hopes his children will have a better life.

"Of course, a big house would be better, but I can't afford it. They're too expensive," he said.

The rental house is in good shape, but for the size of his family, it's less than ideal. Wall's $1,300 monthly rent chews up more than the benchmark set by the Canada Mortgage and Housing Corporation (CHMC) for what is considered to be affordable housing — less then 30 per cent of before-tax household income.

"You pay hydro bills, you pay phone bills and you pay your rent, that's pretty much asking me for all the money I make," he said.

Wall earns $2,500 a month, but even with an additional $740 he gets each month from the province's rental assistance program, there's little left over to make ends meet.

A CBC analysis of two Statistics Canada data sets released in 2020 found that 40 per cent of people renting in rural Manitoba are considered to be in "core housing need" — either they're paying too much based on their income, living in spaces that are too small for the number of residents or in housing that's in a poor state of repair.

Based on that criteria, rural Manitoba has the highest rate of people in core housing need anywhere in Canada. The same analysis found that 23 per cent of those renting in rural Manitoba are living in places that fail two or more housing standards, also the highest of any province.

The population of Winkler, located about 100 kilometres southwest of Winnipeg, has nearly doubled since 2001 and now sits at about 13,750, according to Statistics Canada's 2021 census. A CMHC report last year pegged its rental vacancy at 1.4 per cent, well below the benchmark of three per cent that Manitoba considers a "balanced" rental market.

"We've heard loud and clear from our mayors and reeves outside of the city of Winnipeg that they have significant housing demands," said Manitoba Families Minister Rochelle Squires.

She points to the province's Rent Assist program as a way for low-income renters to deal with rising costs. The benefit is geared to income and ranges between $423 and $1,379 per month.