Most SROs were originally intended to be short-term accommodations for seasonal male workers, as well as young families, and recent immigrants, in the early 1900s. Two hotels which would later become notorious, the Balmoral and the Regent, were even considered luxury accommodations. However, first the Depression and then the 1970s closure of psychiatric hospitals (and attendant lack of regard or care of mentally ill Vancouverites), along with the flight of the wealthy and middle class to the suburbs, contributed to the decline and lack of investment in the Downtown Eastside. By the 1970s and 1980s, Vancouver SROs' reputations were poor. A 1989 University of British Columbia thesis by Mercedes Mompel Antolin asserted that only 10%-20% of SROs were of good or acceptable quality at the time of writing. And even by 1989, the number of SROs was diminishing: 2,704 units were lost in the period between 1978 and 1986, largely due to the pressures of an increasingly hot real estate market.