Backstory: I (30) was born in the Okanagan and until recently spent my entire life there. While there was always an acknowledgment that living there came with a 'sunshine tax', when I was first striking out on my own it wasn't hard to find basic accomodation (apartments and such) that were affordable, if not cheap. For most of my adult life (10 years) I lived in the same rent-controlled 2-bedroom condo with my son and my partner, watching rents steadily rise. The last 2 years or so, I watched the cost of an apartment like mine absolutely explode, and particularly in the last year. 2 bedroom apartments there have passed the median price of $2000/month.

And then it happened. Our condo was sold and the new owner renovicted us. We crunched the numbers and realized that we basically could not afford a new place in Kelowna- anything remotely reasonably priced had fierce competition, dozens if not hundreds of applicants. At the same time this was happening my partner was presented with a career opportunity to move to Winnipeg- and we did. A place I'd never been and have few connections to.

The hardest part of it all is that I have a 12 year old son who I have always shared joint custody of with his father. I won't see my son for months until he moves out here with us after the school year is over, and then he will only see his father for 10 weeks/year, instead of half the week as has been our arrangement his entire life. The cost of housing in Kelowna has effectively driven our family apart and deprived my son of a parent who has always been able to be there for him.

And it's not just us. So many people in my peer group (4 individuals/couples), have been displaced or are in the process of being displaced from their long term rentals at the moment by landlords looking to sell and are running into the same issue we are. Extremely competitive, expensive rental market, locked out of buying so much as a condo or older trailer home, contemplating living in their car or a tent for the summer. These are hardworking people with careers, good references and decent cashflow. Its just not enough to find something, anything to live in.

It's a crisis, not just of affordability, but a crisis of the pain of displacement, loss of time with family and friends, loss of access to children, loss of hope, fear of homelessness, of being overburdened by housing costs, of the shame of reliance on parents well into adulthood, of pride, of seeing the fruits of your life's labor. It's not just money, it's not just the difficult predicament of not being able to become a homeowner. There's almost no societal benefit to this that I can discern. Just a small group of people getting very lucky at the great expense of so many others.

Thanks for listening to me complain. Its been an awful few months.