Glossary
Rental market glossary
The terms we use, defined simply. When in doubt, the definition matters more than the number.
- Asking rent
- The publicly advertised price for a unit for rent. It doesn’t prove the rent eventually signed in a lease. Learn more
- In-place rent
- The rent actually set in a current tenant’s lease. It often differs from the asking rent of an available unit.
- Comparable (rent comp)
- A building similar to yours — area, unit type, era, finish — whose rents serve as a point of comparison. Learn more
- Rental market survey
- A structured, dated comparison of the asking rents of comparable buildings for the same unit type. Learn more
- Price basis
- What an advertised amount represents: one exact unit, a “from” price, a range, or an unknown basis. Learn more
- “From” price
- The starting price of a unit type or floorplan. It isn’t the rent of a specific apartment.
- Rent range
- A price interval covering several units of the same type in a building.
- 3½, 4½, 5½
- Québec’s room-count labels; the half is the bathroom. A 4½ usually has two bedrooms, but not always.
- Inclusions
- What the rent covers: heat, hot water, appliances, parking, etc. They must be normalized before comparing.
- Observation
- A price seen at a source on a given date. Several observations of one offer describe its history, not extra units.
- Current-evidence window
- How long an observation counts as current. RentData uses 7 days by default. Learn more
- Insufficient evidence
- When too few current comparables exist to support a reliable summary. The report explains this instead of estimating.
- Vacancy rate
- The share of rental units that are unoccupied and available, as measured by CMHC among others. Online offers alone can’t establish it.
- CMHC
- Canada Mortgage and Housing Corporation. Publishes the annual Rental Market Survey, which covers rents of occupied units.
- TAL
- Québec’s Tribunal administratif du logement (housing tribunal). Its rules govern increases on existing leases, independently of market rents.