With an attempt to address the shortage of housing available in the community, the City of Yorkton has started a housing incentive program where new builders will receive a 50 per cent rebate on residential lots, and a full tax exemption for five years.

“Basically you apply, and you pay the regular price of the lot. When you build, we rebate you 50 per cent of that original price, and all of these lots in the city are already serviced,” explained the city’s current Mayor Mitch Hippsley.

The idea for the incentive stemmed from the city’s Economic Development Committee and was first introduced earlier in the year.

We have more Ag industry businesses coming to Yorkton, international companies. With that brings more business and with that brings many more jobs,” Hippsley said.

“These people who move here need a place to live of course, and that’s what is taking up all of the housing availability. We have to get going on this. It’s extremely important if we want to get people to move here.”

The incentive applies to approximately 70 city owned residential lots across subdivisions like CJ Houston Place, Riverside Meadows, Riverside Terrace and York Landing.

One local developer who is in the midst of building a 4-unit townhouse said the initiative sparked his interest.

“We looked at other lots in the city that were privately owned and came up on this new development (York Landing),” explained property builder Andy Katzberg.

“There was the city incentives of the five-year tax abatement and 50 per cent off the purchased price of the lot which started to make real sense.”

Katzberg told CTV News this is his fourth development in Yorkton, but the first build that is eligible for the incentive.

Obviously when youre building, everything is kind of dollars and cents, and I guess land acquisition is no different. This was basically the best deal in the city, he said.

“It’s tough to build now. There’s lots of things that play into it whether it’s costs, there’s labour shortages, all kinds of things, but in the end, you just have to make the dive and jump in.”

Currently the number of available residential lots in the city are low compared to similar cities across the province, explained Corey Werner, broker and owner of Core Real Estate.

“The active listings we’re sitting at are about 75. That’s listings that don’t have a conditional offer,” Werner stated.

“It would be a little bit higher because there are some that have listings that have conditions on them, but comparing us to Swift Current, right now their active inventory is around 136 listings.”

How to solve the city’s housing crunch?

Werner explained how having new builds in a city is essential for attracting future homebuyers and renters.

“When you have new construction, it shows economically that your city is a strong, viable community. It always has an impact, it’s sort of like the new car syndrome,” he expressed.

“If you have a product that’s out on the market, it generally brings new people into the market. By not having new construction, we’re basically losing out on two, possibly three, additional sales because there is always the upgrade happening.”

Aside from the incentive, Werner shared suggestions on how to address the city’s shortage for housing.

“I really think the city needs to look at considering secondary suites, even laneway housing, doing higher density housing,” he expressed.

“If you look at some of the larger cities, they try to build a smaller footprint house, two-story, a detached garage. I know we do have some of that style of construction. I think the city has to adjust to different styles of construction as well.”

With the Bank of Canada recently cutting the interest rate from 4.25 per cent to 3.75 per cent, Werner said it can potentially help future homeowners and residents.

“Another aspect that I think is going to help with the new construction is the Bank of Canada just dropped their mortgage rate so that’s definitely going to help,” Werner said.

“I think we’re back at a more normalized interest rate. Those good days of like 1.9 per cent that wasn’t as realistic, but I think this interest rate they’re coming down to is going to help cushion that a little bit.”

“Hopefully we can see more confidence in the buyers out there and taking that step into buying a house or building a house.”