Is infill impacting property values? The short answer is, it’s complicated, but one city councillor is determined to get the facts straight.
On Tuesday, council voted 9-4 in support of a motion by Ward tastawiyiniwak Coun. Karen Principe calling for a report “detailing the impact on surrounding property values due to infill housing in the RS – Small Scale Residential zone,” with councillors Erin Rutherford, Ashley Salvador, Jo-Anne Wright and Keren Tang against.
Principe said she needed better information to respond to concerns from constituents.
“I attended a town hall which had many residents show up with concerns with regards to infill,” she said. “Some of the concerns I was hearing was a decrease in property value yet others were concerned about increases in property taxes.
“It would be nice to see the hard data.”
During the meeting, city business operations manager Stephen Leroux pointed out it’s difficult to pinpoint a single variable affecting property values and while infill could affect prices in either direction, there’s a number of other factors which could impact an assessment. These include the neighbourhood itself, as well as the age and conditions of the building and the buildings around it.
Leroux added property values fluctuate annually and a one-year-drop may not necessarily indicate a trend.
“If we say a house that’s ready to be torn down and next to it is an eight-plex,” he said. “In that case, the way the street is developing and the way the values are moving in that particular neighbourhood, it could potentially be a good thing for that property. If we’re talking about a brand-new two-storey house that’s being developed and on either side of it are eight-plexes, maybe that’s a different story.
“It’s also hard to separate that from the broader market effects and macroeconomic factors. Infill or not, any of the variables we look at when we’re thinking about property value, it’s hard to say in absolute certainty that any of those in and of itself is the cause of the overall change to the entire market.”
Ward papastew Coun. Michael Janz said increasing density uplifts the amount of property tax the city can collect from an area, which long-term should mean homeowners won’t see as many dramatic increases in their annual tithes as they have in recent memory.
Noting Edmonton has been developing infill since its founding, Janz pointed to an earlier report citing an example of a $400,000 parking lot replaced with a multi-million dollar building.
Mayor Andrew Knack said the city’s data shows an overall positive trend in property values but added the city could communicate that better.
“Generally speaking, across the city our assessment values continue to go up each and every year as they change over the last 10 years,” he said. “That’s data that can help show how the city’s evolving.
“I think that is really good data to put publicly in front of people. It’s a real issue people raise.”
Councillors will receive the report in the fall of 2027 at an Urban Planning Committee meeting.
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