An overview of Halifax, Nova Scotia’s rental housing market

Abstract

Halifax, Nova Scotia is experiencing a major rental housing affordability and availability issue. Many Haligonians are under increasing financial pressure, posting their complaints via online forums and on social media concerning the increasing living costs. In response the Provincial Government imposed a rent cap, limiting annual increase to 2% and preventing “renovictions”. The goal of this research is to look at the rental market across the Halifax Regional Municipality (HRM) exploring the geography of rental unit characteristics and prices. Using web scraping techniques on Kijiji and collecting data from local developers’ websites the study employs a comprehensive dataset of up-to-date rental housing information in the HRM. Analysing the database in GIS software shows high unaffordability throughout the North end of Halifax’s urban core and a lack of rental amenities available to those living inside the urban core. The second part of this study dives into the difference between primary and secondary rental housing in the HRM, observing secondary rental housing while being more expensive offer greater amenities than primary rental housing.