United Way Perth Huron recently released a new report detailing how the housing crisis is impacting local residents.
The Our Stories of the Housing Crisis report was done through a survey conducted back in 2024, asking people in the area how rising housing costs have affected them.
Will Wellington, United Way's Manager of the Social Research and Planning Council, says the responses they got show troubling trends.
"From homeowners, we heard that a lot of them were suffering from increased payments on their current house, with interest rates going up. From renters, we heard that the overall market, the rent had just gone up so much that they were just sort of stuck in place. So that was a big theme," Wellington said.
The over 700 responses United Way received as part of the survey identified that housing costs are greatly affecting other areas of people's lives.
"People were cutting back on things like their recreation spending, living much more withdrawn lives, not going out and enjoying their communities. Also, almost just as much, people were cutting back on essentials like groceries, primarily groceries when it came to essentials," Wellington added.
Essentials that were cut back on also included hydro and transportation, and that ultimately, the rising costs of home ownership and rent is greatly affecting people's mental health.
Wellington says the need for affordable housing solutions is dire, and responses in the survey are asking for many different solutions.
"Some people are talking more about developers developing smaller housing or apartments, or little bungalows and starter homes. So there's some support for that among respondents to the survey," Wellington noted. "People also talked about rent-geared-to-income housing, public housing, non-profit housing. So that's housing where the price is not determined by where the market's at on a particular day. It's determined by the affordability needs of the people that are going to live there."
The report, which features hundreds of quotes from real Huron Perth residents, can be seen at PerthHuron.UnitedWay.ca.
"This report is an attempt to document the impact of the housing crisis on Perth-Huron residents," said Kristin Crane, UWPH Director of Community Impact and Research. "While we hear about housing all the time, we don’t hear how it’s affecting our neighbours, our friends, our coworkers. Our goal was to tell those local stories."
Just as importantly, the report demonstrates that, “it is real people behind all the cries for help,” in the words of a West Perth resident who took part in the survey.
