 | |
| Company type | Public |
|---|---|
| TSX: DRM | |
| Industry | Real estate development |
| Founded | 1994 |
| Headquarters | |
Key people | P. Jane Gavan, President, Asset Management; Ana Bailão Former Head of Affordable Housing & Public Affairs (Jan to March 2023) |
| Total assets | $15b (2021 [1] ) |
Number of employees | 551 (2022) [2] |
| Website | dream |
Dream Unlimited Corporation is a Canadian real estate development company that is developing the Waterfront Toronto property on Lake Ontario. It manages $15 billion of real estate assets.
Dream Unlimited was founded in 1994. [3]
In 2021, Dream Unlimited had $15 billion of assets under management, $9 billion of which are fee earning. [4] It owned 11.2 million square feet of commercial rentable real estate, including 26,018 residential rental units. [4]
By 2021, it has completed construction of $38 billion of commercial real estate and renewable energy infrastructure. [4]
In January 2022, the company launched the Dream Community Foundation, not-for-profit organization. [5]
In January 2023, Toronto's former deputy mayor Ana Bailão joined Dream Unlimited as the head of affordable housing and public affairs. [6] Bailão resigned from her role in March 2023, as she announced her campaign to be the next mayor of Toronto. [7]
In April 2023, tenants of the company's residential tower block on 33 King Street, Toronto protested after the Dream Unlimited sought permission from the Landlord and Tenant Board to implement rent increases higher than the board's normal maximum. [8]
In 2019, Dream Unlimited proposed three designs to the City of Toronto to develop a downtown Toronto multi-storey property at 49 Ontario Street. [9]
In December 2022, Dream Unlimited was approved by Waterfront Toronto to develop 12 acres of lakeside Toronto that Google subsidiary Sidewalk Labs abandoned plans to develop in 2020. [10] Dream Unlimited will develop the land with Great Gulf Group, both companies will operate as Quayside Impact Limited Partnership. [11] [12] The project plans to incorporate 800 affordable residences. [13]
Along with Diamond Corporation, FRAM + Slokker, and the Kilmer Group, Dream Unlimited are developing a 72 acre housing development in Mississauga known as Brightwater Community. [14]
In June 2023, over 200 tenants in 33 King Street, one of the company's residential building, joined a collective action to withhold rent as a form of protest (see rent strike), citing abnormal rent increases and maintenance issues. They were joined by tenants of their neighboring building, 22 John Street, which also belongs to Dream Unlimited. On July 15, they marched from the buildings to the offices of both Local MPP, Michael Ford's office and the then-Federal Housing Minister, Ahmed Hussen's office. [15]
Four months into the first rent strike, Toronto Mayor Olivia Chow made an attempt to mediate negotiations in September 2023. Despite an invitation extended to Dream Unlimited, no representatives of the real estate company showed up at the meeting. [16]
The rent strikes continued into 2024. As of January 2024, there were 76 active L1 applications for 33 King Street filed by the company to the Landlord and Tenant Board. Michael Cooper, CEO of Dream, denied the existence of such case, "There's no such thing as a rent strike". [17]
In September 2024, The Breach reported that properties under management by Dream Unlimited were using YieldStar, an algorithmic software tool developed by RealPage, which facilitates the sharing of real-time information about rental pricing and occupancy rates by landlords and is alleged by the US Justice Department to harm renters by decreasing competition, to set rental prices for apartments. [18]
Renting, also known as hiring or letting, is an agreement where a payment is made for the use of a good, service or property owned by another over a fixed period of time. To maintain such an agreement, a rental agreement is signed to establish the roles and expectations of both the tenant and landlord. There are many different types of leases. The type and terms of a lease are decided by the landlord and agreed upon by the renting tenant.
Eviction is the removal of a tenant from rental property by the landlord. In some jurisdictions it may also involve the removal of persons from premises that were foreclosed by a mortgagee.
A lease is a contractual arrangement calling for the user to pay the owner for the use of an asset. Property, buildings and vehicles are common assets that are leased. Industrial or business equipment are also leased. In essence, a lease agreement is a contract between two parties: the lessor and the lessee. The lessor is the legal owner of the asset, while the lessee obtains the right to use the asset in return for regular rental payments. The lessee also agrees to abide by various conditions regarding their use of the property or equipment. For example, a person leasing a car may agree to the condition that the car will only be used for personal use.
A leasehold estate is an ownership of a temporary right to hold land or property in which a lessee or a tenant has rights of real property by some form of title from a lessor or landlord. Although a tenant does hold rights to real property, a leasehold estate is typically considered personal property.
Property management is the operation, control, maintenance, and oversight of real estate and physical property. This can include residential, commercial, and land real estate. Management indicates the need for real estate to be cared for and monitored, with accountability for and attention to its useful life and condition. This is much akin to the role of management in any business.
Rent control in Ontario refers to a system of rent regulation in Ontario, Canada which limits the amount by which the rent paid by tenants for rental accommodation can increase. It applies to any unit that was first occupied for residential purposes before November 15, 2018.
A security deposit is a sum of money held in trust.
Rent regulation in New York is a means of limiting the amount of rent charged on dwellings. Rent control and rent stabilization are two programs used in parts of New York state. In addition to controlling rent, the system also prescribes rights and obligations for tenants and landlords.
Lease audit is also referred to as Rent Audit, CAM Audit and Escalation Expense Audit. However, as the audit involves the inspection of other rights and obligations, names such as Lease Compliance Consulting and Lease Review are more appropriate.
Ana Bailão is a Canadian politician who represented Davenport on Toronto City Council from 2010 until 2022. She was the deputy mayor of Toronto representing Toronto and East York from 2017 to 2022. Bailão placed second in the 2023 Toronto mayoral by-election, losing to former NDP MP Olivia Chow.
The Ellis Act is a 1985 California state law that allows landlords to evict residential tenants to "go out of the rental business" in spite of desires by local governments to compel them to continue providing rental housing.
In commercial real estate leases in the United States, the tenant, rather than the landlord, is usually responsible for real estate taxes, maintenance, and insurance. In a "net lease", in addition to base rent, the tenant or lessee is responsible for paying some or all of the recoverable expenses related to real-estate ownership. As the rent collected under a net lease is "net" after expenses are passed through to tenants to be paid, the rent tends to be lower than rent charged under a "gross lease".
Rent regulation in Canada is a set of laws and policies which control the amount by which rental prices for real property can increase year to year. Each province and territory can pass legislation, where the purpose is to limit rent prices increasing beyond what is affordable for most home dwellers.
Rent regulation is a system of laws for the rental market of dwellings, with controversial effects on affordability of housing and tenancies. Generally, a system of rent regulation involves:
The Costa–Hawkins Rental Housing Act ("Costa–Hawkins") is a California state law enacted in 1995, placing limits on municipal rent control ordinances. Costa–Hawkins preempts the field in two major ways. First, it prohibits cities from establishing rent control over certain kinds of residential units, such as single-family dwellings, condominiums, and newly constructed apartment units. Second, it prohibits "vacancy control", also called "strict" rent control. The legislation was sponsored by Democratic Senator Jim Costa and Republican Assemblymember Phil Hawkins.
RealPage, Inc. is an American multinational corporation that provides property management software for the multifamily, commercial, single-family, and vacation rental housing industries. Its services are used to manage more than 24 million housing units worldwide. Dana Jones is chairman of the board and chief executive officer.
Quayside is a waterfront district Toronto, Ontario, Canada, located between Queens Quay East and Parliament Street. The 4.9 hectares site is owned by Waterfront Toronto, the City of Toronto and CreateTO and private landowners. In June 2023, Waterfront Toronto proposed a new master-planned mixed-use development of the former dockland and industrial site to succeed Sidewalk Toronto, an unrealised smart city proposed by Alphabet Inc. subsidiary Sidewalk Labs.
First Capital REIT is a Canadian public real estate company, specializing in retail real estate, and based in Toronto, Ontario. It is one of the largest retail landlords in Canada.
Greystar Real Estate Partners is an international real estate developer and manager based in the United States. As of 2023, Greystar had over $76 billion in gross assets under management, and operated in 17 countries.
Tricon Residential is a Canadian real estate company. The company invests in single-family rental and multi-family rental homes, and owns about 31,000 properties across the United States and Canada. As of February 2021, the company had about $8.2 billion of assets under management.