How we did it.

Salesmatic

Real Estate
Research

Blair and Co. produced a comprehensive select rental building survey covering Calgary's Downtown and Beltline rental market in Fall 2017, benchmarking 29 apartment buildings across pricing, promotions, parking, suite features, and building amenities. The survey gave rental property clients and developers a complete, current picture of the competitive landscape in one of Calgary's highest-density rental corridors, with detailed project profiles, floor plan data, and price-per-square-foot analysis across one and two-bedroom units at every surveyed building.

The Calgary Downtown and Beltline rental market in 2017 was a dense, highly competitive environment with significant variation in pricing, suite specification, promotion strategy, and amenity offering across 29 active buildings managed by operators including Boardwalk, Bentall Kennedy, ONE Properties, Vertica, Battistella, Cidex Group, and independents. A property owner, developer, or leasing team making decisions about pricing, promotions, parking fees, suite finishes, or building amenity investment without a structured benchmark of what the immediate competition was offering was making those decisions in the dark. The vision for this survey was to eliminate that blind spot entirely, producing a single reference document that gave clients a precise, building-by-building comparison across every variable that a prospective tenant evaluates and every variable that drives leasing performance and revenue per unit.

Methodology

Blair and Co. structured the survey to cover five distinct competitive dimensions across all 29 buildings. The pricing section documented small and large unit rents alongside damage deposit requirements and utility inclusions, giving clients a direct apples-to-apples comparison of net effective rent across the market. The promotions section documented every active leasing incentive in the market, from months-free offers and reduced deposits to TELUS TV and internet inclusions and veteran discounts, giving clients a clear picture of what the competitive promotional environment looked like and what a new or repositioning property would need to offer to compete. The parking section documented availability, type, and monthly cost across indoor, outdoor, and covered options at every building, a variable that significantly affects the total cost of tenancy and the relative competitiveness of a building’s offer. The suite features section documented the finish levels, appliance packages, in-suite laundry availability, flooring, countertop materials, and special features at each building, allowing clients to benchmark their product specification against the market. The building amenities section mapped guest suites, common areas, laundry rooms, fitness centres, on-site management, recycling, sauna and pool facilities, storage rooms, and bicycle storage across all 29 buildings.

Process

Field research was conducted across all 29 buildings in the survey area, spanning the Beltline and Downtown corridors from Continental Towers at the affordable end of the market to Versus and Fifteen15 at the premium end. Each building was profiled individually with address, management company, pricing, pet policy and costs, parking availability and costs, floor plan data including bedroom count, bathroom count, square footage, and monthly rent for each available suite type, and a location map showing the building’s position within the Calgary street grid. Pricing data was compiled and charted across four views: one-bedroom absolute price, one-bedroom price per square foot, two-bedroom absolute price, and two-bedroom price per square foot, allowing clients to identify where their building sat relative to the market at both a headline and a value-per-square-foot level. The full survey was produced as a structured report and delivered to clients with a complimentary market overview and direct contact for follow-up strategic consultation.

Outcome

The Select Rental Building Survey gave Blair and Co. clients operating in the Calgary Downtown and Beltline rental market a research-grade competitive reference covering every building and every leasing variable that matters to a prospective tenant and a property management team. The price-per-square-foot analysis in particular gave clients a more precise competitive positioning tool than headline rent comparisons alone, identifying buildings that appeared competitively priced on an absolute basis but were at a premium or discount when measured against the market on a square footage basis. The promotions analysis gave leasing teams a clear picture of what incentives the market was offering and what the floor on competitive promotion looked like across buildings at different price tiers. The building-by-building profiles gave development and asset management teams the product specification benchmarks needed to make informed decisions about suite finish investments, amenity additions, and repositioning strategies.

Skills Used

  • Rental Market Research
  • Competitive Building Survey
  • Field Research
  • Pricing Analysis
  • Price Per Square Foot Analysis
  • Promotions Benchmarking
  • Parking Cost Analysis
  • Suite Feature Benchmarking
  • Building Amenity Mapping
  • Floor Plan Data Collection
  • Research Report Design and Production
  • Calgary Rental Market Intelligence
  • Beltline and Downtown Calgary Market Research

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