KINGSTON – It has become even harder to find rental accommodations in Kingston, according to new statistics released Wednesday.

The city’s oft-quoted 2017 rental vacancy rate of 0.7 per cent, the lowest in Ontario, dropped to 0.6 per cent in 2018, according to the Canadian Mortgage and Housing Corporation’s rental market survey.

“Most urban centres posted stable vacancy rates. Greater Sudbury and Kingston bucked the provincial trend by being the only markets posting a significant drop in rental vacancy rates,” the annual survey of rental properties stated. “Thunder Bay, Kitchener and St. Catharines-Niagara posted the biggest increase in vacancy rates. Kingston, Toronto and Guelph registered the lowest vacancy rates across the province.”

The vacancy rate for a one-bedroom apartment dropped from 0.6 per cent in 2017 to 0.5 per cent this year; for a two-bedroom apartment dropped 0.9 per cent in 2017 to 0.6 per cent in 2018; and for a three-bedroom apartment dropped from 0.3 per cent in 2017 to 0.1 per cent in 2018.

The vacancy rate for bachelor apartments increased from 1.0 per cent last year to 1.2 per cent this year, as did the rate for townhouses, increasing from 0.7 per cent to 2.3 per cent this year.

The rate at which rents are increasing also slowed slightly from last year, dropping from 3.1 per cent in 2017 to 2.7 per cent in 2018.

The overall vacant rate in Ontario is 1.8 per cent.