[AlanE]

Originally Posted by strider3700

I think they wanted to do the tax benefit for large buildings not individual homes. There is zero incentive for landlords to do anything with their rental units up here.

We're now through the Looking Glass. Look there's the Mad Hatter over there.

For a conventional residential tenancy rent increase in British Columbia that takes effect in 2012, the allowable increase is 4.3 per cent.

There is zero incentive because the government prohibits the landlords from benefiting from such improvements.

If there is a near zero rental availability rate then that is a pretty strong signal that the rents being charged are below the market clearing rate. If landlords had the ability to price to market then there would be incentive to improve units for they would be able to recoup via rent what they invest in their housing stock.

The availability situation in many towns is so bad people will stay in mold infested hellholes with holes in the roof for years simply because there is no where else for them to go.

Again, government created shortages. You and I live in the same city. We are dealing with the Urban Containment Boundary which artificially restricts development. On one side of the street, at the border of the boundary, high density development is allowed and on the other side of the street no development is allowed and those properties are forever destined to remain farms and hobby farms. Then there are all of the government imposed regulations which drive up the cost of building. Check on Craigslist and you can probably find someone giving away double paned aluminum windows for free. Try putting those windows in a new construction. The government won't let you do it. The government forces you to buy new windows which meet current standards. How much energy does one have to save in order to make up the difference in cost between FREE and $30,000?

With government controlling how much rent increase a landlord can charge, with government controlling eviction processes to make it damn difficult to evict a bad tenant, etc, being a landlord is not as attractive an investment strategy as it used to be, hence people deciding to invest their money elsewhere, thus drying up the rental market and causing shortages.

Convincing a landlord to spend tens if not hundreds of thousands on an apartment building so that his clients can have lower costs on their bills is never going to happen.

This is true. Let's assume that the energy efficiency rehab actually saves money. OK? Now rationally what should happen is the landlord raises the rent so as to recover the cost of the repairs. The tenant shouldn't object because what he has to pay for in increased rent is MORE than made up for by his lowered utility bills every month. Both sides benefit and everyone is happy. The fly in the ointment here is that government prohibits this landlord from raising the rent by more than 4%. Sure the tenant could save money and energy usage would decrease, but why should the tenant and society get all the benefits with the landlord getting none but having to foot the whole bill?

I'm not saying it's a good idea I'm just saying that is probably why they are considering the tax benefit route.

What's the definition of insanity? Doing the same thing over and over again and expecting a different outcome. How should we fix a problem that was caused by government meddling in private contracts? Why interjecting the government into more private contracts.