You’ve probably heard that its a good time to buy real estate in Kingston. Maybe you’ve heard it from a friend who invests, a real estate agent, or a post on facebook. What makes it a good time to buy in Kingston though? Predicting the real estate market is not an easy task – how can someone be so sure?

“What is a Vacancy Rate? How does it make me money???”

The answer is actually fairly simple: More people are looking for homes in Kingston, than there are homes in Kingston… That awkwardly worded sentence can be simplified even further to: supply and demand.

We measure the supply and demand of a city’s rental market by finding the percentage of all rental units that are available in the city. This number is called the vacancy rate.

From 2016 to 2017, the vacancy rate in Kingston’s rental market dropped from 2.6% to 0.7%. This was the lowest in all of Ontario. (For comparison, 3% is generally considered a healthy vacancy rate.)

This low vacancy rate means that there are not many units available for people to rent, which leads to higher rental prices, and potentially rising home prices as well.

In 2017, the average rent for a bedroom in Kingston was $975, while the average home price was $333,080. For comparison to similar sized cities; in Peterborough the average rent for a one bedroom was $850, and $840 in London, each with average home prices of $397,504 and $339,000 respectively (average home prices taken from The Peterborough Examiner & CBC). See where I’m going with this?

This is what makes Kingston in particular a good area to purchase a home for investors looking to rent out properties. So much so that Kingston is being recognized for its ability to turn a profit for local homeowners, which could in turn make the real estate market more competitive, raising prices in the future.

Now you know! If you want to know a bit more about the home buying process, or want to equip yourself with some real estate knowledge to help you win an argument with your friends, call me anytime at 613-483-5444, I’m always available 🙂