Condo for Cars Planned in Toronto

An article by Joshua Chong and Ivy Mak reports that a developer has plans to build a new "penthouse" for cars: "Toronto-based real estate brokerage firm Metropolitan Commercial Realty recently announced plans to build what it describes as the city’s first-ever 'car condo.'"

The development team, known as ToyBx, is still working through the planning and zoning approvals process for 180,000-square-foot facility housing boast 195 units and 39 penthouse suites. "Units start from 565 sq. ft. and can house a minimum of four cars," according to the article.

The story about Toronto's condos for cars development is the second example of car condos shared by Planetizen in recent months. In August, the news was about a developer in New York City converted a garage on the Upper East Side into a condominium for cars, asking $350,000 for a spot.

Both articles put this news in the context of the pandemic-related upheaval in urban real estate markets—though with slight differences in the examples. In New York, the developers used adaptive reuse to make a new kind of space for more cars after many residents and the daytime office population moved away from the city during the pandemic or bought cars for the first time.

In Toronto, the developer of a new building has responded to criticism about the symbolism of the development (more space for cars while many are struggling to afford housing for humans) by arguing that the development site isn't zoned for residential development.

"I'm sure we're going to get, you know, some people pushing back because of the hard economic times due to COVID, but we're real estate developers and investors and we're filling the void in the market," says Ming Zee, president of Metropolitan Commercial Realty Inc., is quoted as saying in the article by Chong and Mak.