Population and Housing

[Markster]

So, it's true that if enough students preferred houses over the towers then we could see empty towers and no new availability of houses, but I don't think this is actually the case. Friends that rent houses in those neighbourhoods only do so because they're cheap, and not because they prefer it. I think we'll see more tower construction reduce prices for towers as supply catches up with demand for close to campus living, and houses converting back to owner occupied as they become more profitable to sell than to rent to students.

Yeah, worst case, we'll see an oversupply of campus towers finally leading to a drop in rental prices near campus. (A drop that so far has not materialized.)  When I started university in 2003, rents were ~$400/month/bed.  People told me that a few years before, they could find $300 or lower. There's a lot of room for price deflation.

Basically every student living in Lakeshore is living in housing that was never really intended to be "student housing".  There's a lot of townhouses and low-rise walkups still available to convert back to single-family.