This senior sold his home due to interest rate hikes. Now, he can't find an affordable rental
CBC
John Cufflin has just over a week until he has to be out of the house he's owned for three decades — and a lack of affordable rentals in Calgary means right now, the 76-year-old has nowhere to go.
He blames his situation on the Bank of Canada's recent series of interest rate hikes.
"Previously, the money I was spending on my mortgage was approximately $1,000 a month. And in the last year, that has climbed to $2,600 a month," said Cufflin, who makes $2,200 a month through government support.
"[That] is prohibitive for somebody on a single income. So it just left me now in a position where I had to consider the possibility of selling the home."
The home was sold within a month of his decision. Now, he has an even harder job — to find a place to live among tens of thousands of new Albertans doing the same, in a city with the fastest-growing rents and a shrinking rental vacancy rate.
"It's extremely difficult at the moment ... I need something which is affordable based on the income that I'm receiving."
The avid antique collector is looking at moving in with a roommate, and even returning back to the workforce at 76 years old to hopefully afford his own home again someday.
Those in the business of helping seniors find housing say Cufflin is far from the only one. They say interest rate hikes have created a growing problem across the country, leaving some seniors scrambling for a roof over their heads amid a national affordable housing crisis.
Laura Tamblyn Watts, CEO of national seniors advocacy organization CanAge, says stories like Cufflin's are becoming all too common.
"With the consumer price index skyrocketing and interest rates fluctuating, people who thought that they had enough money no longer do," said Tamblyn Watts.
It's a double-edged sword. While some older people are forced to sell their homes, it's also getting more expensive to run a property, which often translates into landlords increasing rents for tenants.
"Many, many older people are finding themselves without adequate housing and shelter, having previously owned their own home. And that's never happened before here in Alberta."
But it isn't just Alberta, she says.
"Certainly other big pressure points like Vancouver and Toronto and Montreal and increasingly Halifax, are coming to the same problem."
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