Your latest articles on the dearth of Wesbrook retail and the increased supply of short-term rentals in buildings designated for staff and faculty housing point to a common cause: UBC Properties Trust (UBCPT) pursues short-term profitability over a long-term vision for a vibrant community.
By maximizing rent and forcing out small businesses, UBCPT ensures only bland, corporate behemoths like Save-On-Foods and Shoppers Drug Mart can afford to operate. This results in a boring neighbourhood devoid of character, unappealing for people wanting to invest long-term in a community.
The expansion of short-term rentals in buildings that are designated for staff and faculty long-term housing points to another example of UBCPT greed: housing is overpriced and the market (UBC staff and faculty) have decided to rent off-campus at more affordable options. UBCPT are only expanding short-term rentals to these guest suites because nobody is willing to rent them long-term. If rents were 25 per cent below market, as they claim to be, they would not have upwards of 20 per cent vacancy at some of their buildings, nor would they need to bribe potential tenants with two months free rent to move into these buildings. Instead, they’ve pursued an immediate profit at all costs approach which has resulted in a stagnant tenant population who can get far more value for their money by living in a vibrant Vancouver neighbourhood.
UBCPT needs to recognize that building a desirable community means more than providing nicely manicured lawns or the odd busker during summer months. It means enticing small retail businesses to invest in long-term presence in our community by providing affordable and stable rental agreements. It means offering below-market rents for staff and faculty who want to take a chance on an unproven neighbourhood and grow their lives in it.
Until UBCPT smartens up and stops trying to suck every dollar out of this community, Wesbrook will never be more than a sub-par suburb of Vancouver that is more a landing pad for recent arrivals than a long-term vision of vibrancy.
TOM PINCHON, RESIDENT
We are writing to express concern about the pressures facing small and locally owned businesses at UBC, particularly in Wesbrook Place. As recently reported in The Campus Resident, several businesses have closed, while others face commercial rent increases of 25 per cent to 33 per cent when their leases expire. Increases of this magnitude may be absorbed by large national or multinational corporations, but they can be prohibitive for small independent businesses operating on narrow margins.
These increases also affect affordability at UBC. Businesses facing sharply higher rents must either absorb the costs, reduce services, close or relocate, or pass some of the increase on to customers. This is particularly concerning for students and pensioners, many of whom already live on tight budgets in one of Canada’s most expensive cities. Commercial rents are therefore not simply a matter between landlord and tenant: they affect the cost and quality of life for the entire campus community.
There is also a larger question about the kind of community UBC wants to build. Small and locally owned businesses contribute to the character, diversity, and vitality of our neighbourhoods. If commercial rents rise without regard to the very different capacities of tenants to absorb them, the result may be a campus increasingly dominated by large corporate chains, with fewer independent businesses, reduced commercial diversity, and higher prices.
We therefore encourage UBC and UBC Properties Trust to develop measures to retain small and locally owned businesses, including moderating rent increases, providing greater predictability in lease renewals, and taking into account the contribution these businesses make to campus life. Supporting a diverse local business sector is not simply about helping individual proprietors; it is an investment in an affordable, inclusive, and vibrant UBC community.
FABIOLA BAZO AND BRAD PARSON, RESIDENTS
Residents will be heard
Neighbours can follow up on the recent articles and ongoing discussion in The Campus Resident around improving campus housing for UBC’s employees (“No Response From UBC on UNA Call for Housing Action” The Campus Resident, July 2026).
We have new and substantive opportunities to be heard by UBC Properties Trust, and I’d like to see this issue continue to be reported on. However, I’d also like to collect your thoughts about how to improve our experiences of living in our company town while advocating for those ideas with UBCPT as the President of the University Faculty And Staff Tenants’ Association (UFASTA).
Writing a letter to the editor here is one option, but if you would like to join other employee-residents for a potluck or a video conversation about this in the next couple weeks, please sign up at tinyurl. com/ywsmu7jz or email me at erica.frank@ubc.ca.
ERICA FRANK, RESIDENT AND UBC PROFESSOR