Student union at Conestoga College aims to focus on housing as more students struggle in a tight market

The unionrepresenting Conestoga College students says it plans to work on addressingstudent housing issues, after a report highlighted ongoing challenges students face in finding accommodationsin the area.

Conestoga Students Inc.'s (CSI)advocacy department created a focus group thatasked students over the 2020-21 year about their experiences finding housing in the area, and released their findings in March of this year.

"Over the last few years we've started to notice a steady increase in the number of students raising concern about housing safety, affordability and more as an issue to seek additional supports," Sana Banu, presidentof CSI,told CBC Kitchener-Waterloo.

"That's how we broadly started to evaluate the issues identified, and wanted to see what best practices that other post secondary institutions are doing currently in the housing sphere."

Lack of resources, housing andaffordability

The almost90-pagereport highlighted three main issuesvoiced by students and offersa long list of recommendations and best practices.

It describedconcerns around an absence of reliable housing information and resources for students, as well as unsafe housing conditions.

The reportfound someinternational students felt theywere misled by collegerecruiters about the cost of living in the area, and indicatedconcerns around the availability and affordability of housing.

"We also heard students cite several external restraints such as lack of credit guarantors for international students especially, who do not have an existing credit history," Banu said.

Banu notes theissues cited in the report also affect domestic students coming from other cities or out of province. She saidthe report has not yet been approved by CSI'sboard of directors, but expects it will be once the fall semester starts.

"Predominantly, that will be on our radar first, then we will get into the feasibility of what is possible for us as an organization to take on," she said.

Tightrental market

As post-secondary students return to in-person classes this fallsemester, thechallenge of finding available and affordable units hasbeen felt in otherparts of the province by international students.

Conestoga College has the second-largest population of international students among colleges in Ontario, according toareportfrom the province's auditor general in 2021.

Nida Zohra is starting her second year at Conestoga College this fall. She came to Waterloo from the Middle East in May 2021 and said at thattime, finding a unit was easier becauseclasses were still virtual.

"It was mid-lockdownand I got lucky looking for a place the first time I came here, I found a place really quickly. In January I had everything finalized," Zohra told CBC.

Finding a place for this fall semester however, wastough. She said many international students rely on Facebook Marketplaceto find accommodations, and the competition has beenfierce.

"When I was scouring through Facebook, it came to a point where if I did not [reply] to a post in the first 10 minutes, it was gone," she said.

Ashish Bhatia, who works as a content creator for CSI, also hasexperience seekinga unit ina tightrental market and has heard from many students about their own challenges.

"When I was looking for housing and accommodation, once I started visiting places, like for open houses at five or six houses, landlords were starting a bidding system," he said.

"Students already living here are having such a hard time getting accommodations, but what do you expect for a student who is not even in the country?"

To help international students navigate their new life in Canada, Bhatiapostsshort information videos on platforms like Instagramand Youtube.

Future growth inLower Doon

The City of Kitcheneris currently working on how it will accommodate future growth in the Lower Doon area, which has become ahot spotfor student housing.

Some of the recommendations for the project include building agreater mix of housing types within Lower Doon, and to developpurpose-built student housing.

Another is to update the city's lodging house by-law, which has not been updated since 2005, according to Helen Fylactou, manager of licensing for the City of Kitchener. She said there arerental units in the area that act like lodging houses, but are not up to code or licensed.

"If we open up the bylaw to allow this kind of property, then I think we can seean increase the number of licensedproperties, which would mean units being more regularly inspected for health and safety," she said.

Fylactou said there is one more round of community consultation in the fall before staff present a design and recommendations to council in 2023.

A spokesperson for the college said the school isworking with the City of Kitchener and CSItofindlong term solutions, but did not provide details on what those solutions could be.