Settlement and housing experiences of recent immigrants in small- and mid-sized cities in the interior British Columbia /

These constraints determine new immigrants‟ choices with regards to whether or not they move to and remain in small- and mid-sized cities in the interior of B. C. In particular, the City of Kelowna, one of the fastest-growing cities in the province, established a reputation as a city to which affluent people retire. [...] In sum, the fact that the number of immigrants choosing to live and work in small- and mid-sized cities on arrival in Canada has increased in the last decades and newcomers face numerous barriers in settling and integrating into these communities has policy implications for (a) understanding new immigrants‟ settlement and housing experiences and (b) understanding how and why some immigrant groups [...] The study‟s results include recommendations for improving immigrants‟ settlement and integration in the interior of B. C. There is very little published data/literature on the settlement and housing experiences of immigrants in this region of British Columbia, and much less on the settlement and housing barriers/challenges that new immigrants face in the local communities. [...] In sum, the data collected in this study will expand the empirical base of knowledge on the settlement and housing experiences of immigrants and will promote a better understanding of the importance of the regionalization of immigration into small- and mid-sized cities in the interior of B. C. Methodology Data for this mixed methods study were gathered between April and August 2015. [...] Special attention in this section focused on the difficulty of the housing search and the outcome in terms of position in the housing market, including housing costs and satisfaction with housing and neighbourhood.