The 68,545 rental dwellings in Hamilton identified in the 2016 Census can be divided into the three main types of rental units: those in private primary rental buildings, those in private secondary units, and subsidized units, most often run by non-profit corporations. Private primary rental market is buildings that were purpose built for renting units to tenants. The private secondary rental market includes a wide variety of units in all kinds of buildings, for example basement apartments in an owner’s home, a duplex with both units rented, but not part of a rental complex, a condo unit owner who rents the unit for long term tenants instead of living in the unit themselves. The secondary market is an important source of rentals, especially in suburban neighbourhoods where there are few purpose built rental buildings, but there is almost no available data on this group of rental units. The Canada Mortgage and Housing Corporation (CMHC) conducts annual rental surveys, but this data only captures private primary rental units. For this reason, the majority of the rental data in this series of bulletin only covers private primary rental units.
