Toronto has entered into something of a laneway house renaissance as tiny homes populate backyards and laneway frontages across the city, but not everyone is happy about this new form of housing.

A curious-looking new home tucked away in the backyard of 456 Armadale Avenue just hit the rental market, offering 0.5 bedrooms in what is essentially a glorified multi-level studio apartment measuring just 650 square feet and renting for $2,450 per month.

It's actually a pretty unique layout with a modern, if not a bit cozy, kitchen setup, and even a ceiling skylight flooding the space with natural light.

The ensuite laundry, sheltered carport, private entrance, and other high-end perks like heated floors throughout the suite, make this laneway unit look and feel like a proper house, albeit a shrunken-down one.

But some neighbours fought tooth and nail to keep this home from ever being built.

In 2021, signs were stapled to utility poles in the neighbourhood in an attempt to fight the tiny home's construction, in what is perhaps the most literal case of local NIMBYism in recent memory: opposing a project happening right in their neighbourhood's backyards.

The alarmist signs with slogans like "Armadale NOT Condodale!" advertised a change.org petition fighting against the development, which — and I'm not making this up — suggested that a tiny laneway home somehow translated to "destroying and degrading our charming, historic community beyond recognition."

A competing change.org petition was also created supporting the development, asking that the City's Committee of Adjustment "approve the variance necessary to build the proposed three-story [sic], four-unit dwelling at 456 Armadale Ave."

In the end, a scaled-down version of the proposal came to fruition, but neighbours still aren't pleased.

One blogTO reader reached out about the newly-listed rental unit, saying, "What even is a .5 bedroom?!?! The way they describe it vs. the objective size of the thing is bananas, and the price is unconscionable."

While $2,450 may seem pricey to anyone who hasn't been following the rental market, it is actually just a shade more than the average one-bedroom rent of $2,418 in Toronto as of June 2023.