Builder Jake Fry, founding partner of Smallworks, partners with citizen property owners to help them achieve more flexibility with their plot, such as building fourplexes like in this rendering.RSA AW
Like a lot of Vancouverites, Jaime Yard and Bill Angelbeck are Gen-Xers who managed to build healthy careers but had never figured a way into the Metro Vancouver property market.
Modest homes just didn’t match up to the ridiculous sticker prices. And so, the anthropology professors raised their family in Vancouver rental housing and watched older colleagues enjoy the benefits of home ownership.
“Retired faculty are in three-storey homes in Vancouver, and you know they have the same salary as us,” said Mr. Angelbeck.
“Timing is everything,” added Ms. Yard.
But with new government policies designed to open up single-family lots to slightly higher density, the couple’s timing may finally be right. Ms. Yard’s 80-year-old mother still lives in the family home in North Burnaby. Ms. Yard and her husband are hoping to live in a new backyard duplex they’re planning to add to the property. Ms. Yard’s mother will continue to live in the bungalow she’s lived in since 1980, which also has a rental unit below.
Together, the family will develop a 2,000-square-foot, two-storey duplex to the rear for Ms. Yard and Mr. Angelbeck, with a student renter or other family member in the smaller unit. The cost of construction will be a little over $1-million.
“What we are trying to build on the whole property is to serve our extended family for a long time,” said Ms. Yard, who’s been thinking about developing the property for around 15 years.
Builder Louis Nguyen wants to build and live in an inter-generational multiplex of his own one day, like this rendering of a five-plex at 2333 E. 54th Avenue.Costar Construction
In late 2023, the province passed legislation to prezone all single-family and duplex zones in the province to three or four units (six units near bus service) for small-scale, multiunit housing. It has been a year since the province set a June 30 deadline for municipalities to comply with the upzoning. Most made the deadline; others asked for extensions. It’s early days for what is colloquially known as the multiplex, but industry take-up is already strong enough that it’s being hailed as a success.
Builder Jake Fry, founding partner of Smallworks, was a pioneer in the laneway housing sector and he now has half a dozen projects in the design stage that fall under the multiplex prezoning, including the Yard/Angelbeck project in North Burnaby. He partners with “citizen developers” who have owned their properties for years to help them densify and create options to let their kids buy in, to downsize and to create rental revenue, without having to leave the neighbourhood. He also uses prefabricated components to build efficiently, something that the federal government recently championed.
“Across the province, they have an opportunity to really much better address what their current housing needs are in a way that gets that kind of equity that would normally get lost if they were just to sell and move somewhere else,” said Mr. Fry. “And at the same time, transfer that wealth to either family members or do long-term strategic planning for their retirement.”
He said the citizen-developed multiplex is “a hack to land speculation” because about half of homeowners are mortgage free and sitting on a lot of equity, and it’s a way to get more housing built while cutting out the land speculation.
“We start to look at how many units can be developed in this methodology across the province, and we’re talking well in excess of 10,000 units that can be built without any cost to the public purse and with a very modest amount of … major infrastructure upgrade to these cities. And it’s financed and it’s actually executed really quickly by the homeowner or whoever they’re working with.”
A rendering of side-by-side duplexes by Laidler Capital Fund LP with Costar Construction and Icon Projects. Due to multiplex prezoning, costs associated with propping up homes are lower, allowing for more affordable homes, says Bill Laidler.Laidler Capital Fund LP
Multiplex housing is defined as three or more units in a single-family house neighbourhood.
The city of Vancouver has 385 development applications either in process or approved for multiplex housing and Burnaby has somewhere between 200 to 300 in process, said Bill Laidler of Laidler Capital. Mr. Laidler, a former realtor and developer, holds in-person and online events to help educate real estate professionals on the new multiplex policy.
He identifies Vancouver and Burnaby as the most viable municipalities for building multiplexes because they offer strata, reasonable permitting timelines and enough floor space ratio to allow three-bedroom units. His investment partners have obtained permits to build fourplexes, side-by-side duplexes and townhouses under the new policy.
“It’s solely focused on understanding which cities have viable bylaws and which cities we need to stay away from, due to uncertainty,” said Mr. Laidler.
“If the cities don’t allow you to stratify them, then with all the city fees, development timelines, construction costs, there’s not enough revenue to make it viable.”
He founded Laidler Capital to provide equity to small builders to help fund multiplex projects, obtaining investment through community members. They currently have 50 units under way, with about half of them in development across three sites.
“I just think that this was probably the boldest regulatory move that we’ve seen by a province to step in and require cities to reduce approval times and create more certainty for developers.”
Because of the prezoning, they don’t have the carrying costs of a lengthy approval timeline, which helps reduce the housing cost. It’s not necessarily affordable for a lot of people, but it’s more affordable, he added.
“We have a project in Burnaby and the Government Road area, where the lowest new home to sell in the last five years was $4 million,” he said. “But now we’re going to be bringing in seven townhomes under $1.6 million [each].”
Builder Louis Nguyen partnered with Laidler Capital to build multiplex housing like this rendering of a six-plex at 2240 E. 40th Ave. These units will be strata titled and priced at around $950 per square foot.Louis Nguyen
A rendering of the courtyard at 2240 E. 40th Ave.Louis Nguyen
Builder Louis Nguyen partnered with Laidler Capital to build multiplex housing – and for Mr. Nguyen, it’s personal. He wants to build and live in an intergenerational multiplex of his own one day. He’s currently raising his young family in a downtown Vancouver condo, where neighbours are sensitive to the sound of kids running around.
“The generational multiplex would be, I believe, the next Vancouver Special.”
Mr. Nguyen will soon launch presales for a five-plex at 2240 E. 40th Ave. and a six-plex at 2333 E. 54th Ave., both on the east side of Vancouver. All of them will be strata titled and priced at around $950 a square foot. That price is lower than a standard duplex because the permitting time is faster with the multiplex, and he doesn’t have to build underground parking.
“We’re aiming to sell it at the right price and sell it fast rather than trying to get the most for the for the money and then just hold on to them,” said Mr. Nguyen.
Editor’s note: Image captions in a previous version of this article incorrectly stated the locations of the multiplexes depicted at 2333 E. 54th Ave. and 2240 E. 40th Ave. This version has been corrected.