COLLINGWOOD -- October was another record-breaking month for real estate sales in the region.

Statistics from the South Georgian Bay association of realtors show the number of sales increased 47 percent over October last year. The benchmark price of a single-family home Climbed 21.8 percent to 513 thousand dollars, vacancies are down, while rents are also seeing an increase.

"Rents have been a surprise to me how quickly they have escalated and how out of context they are with the local market, wage rates and labour force," says community activist Marg Scheben-Edey.

A flood of buyers from the GTA is fuelling the hot housing market. Still, there's mounting evidence that rising prices make the communities around Southern Georgian Bay unaffordable, especially for service industry workers and single-income families who spend more than half their income on housing.

Pamela Hillier, the Executive Director of Community Connection, says that's not sustainable and adds calls for help to 211 are up 153 per cent.

"At the end of the month, there's no money left to buy food, or prescription medicine, or things like that, so people call to see if there are other income sources or help out there to pay for other services that they need."

Advocates for purpose-built housing, including Gail Michalenko, say a bad situation just got worse in Collingwood.

"Our current council is certainly more supportive and recognizes that there's a huge issue with this," says Michalenko, "so now it's time for some action."

"There's a sense of urgency to start addressing the situation," says Scheben-Edey. It's not something we can take likely sometimes it's life and death."