Michael Hinds and Anthony DiCiccio outside the apartment building where they live in Hamilton, Ont. Ontario has seen a substantial increase in applications to evict tenants.Carlos Osorio/The Globe and Mail
In 2020, Justin Klassen and his partner found a place to live that ticked all their boxes. It was the peak of the pandemic and, at $1,400 a month, the two-bedroom apartment in London, Ont., was a corner unit with lots of storage space and big windows.
Three years later, a one-bedroom in Mr. Klassen’s building – half the size of his own unit – is listed at the same price. His landlords have made it clear they want him out, presumably so they can tap into his apartment’s current market value. (Laws in Ontario and other provinces forbid many landlords from hiking rents on existing tenants by more than a few per cent annually.)
Over the past year, the apartment’s owners have presented different reasons for ending the tenancy: building conversion, a new buyer and, finally, rent non-payment. “Every time we sneeze the wrong way we get another eviction notice,” Mr. Klassen said. He believes his landlords are acting in bad faith.
Last month, average asking rents in Canada reached another record high: $2,117 a month, according to Rentals.ca. This means landlords stand to gain more from bad-faith evictions, in which tenants are ousted under false pretenses, often in violation of the law. While these have become increasingly common in Ontario and other parts of Canada, legal experts say disputing them can take such an emotional and financial toll on renters that many give up.
“We see tenants get intimidated by the costs and time of these procedures and not want to go through with it,” said Brittney Forsyth, of Prevail Paralegal, a legal services firm that frequently works with landlords and tenants. She has seen a particularly sharp spike in N12 evictions, an Ontario term for when a landlord claims a unit for personal use, or for the use of a family member or a new buyer.
“It’s difficult to imagine that there are that many homes where a landlord or owner has decided to reoccupy for personal use or sale,” said Douglas Kwan, a director at the Advocacy Centre for Tenants Ontario, a legal clinic that works with tenants. “These properties are investment properties. It’s about landlords trying to keep pace with the market.”
If a tenant can prove a bad-faith eviction, there is some compensation available. In Ontario, the Landlord and Tenant Board might order a landlord to cover a tenant’s moving expenses. “Or sometimes they’ll award costs for the stress of going through these illegal evictions,” Ms. Forsyth said.
But tenants who dispute a case until the end and win are rare, Mr. Kwan said. “Tenant applications take two years to be heard,” he explained.
And winning an eviction dispute at a provincial tribunal doesn’t mean getting compensation. “You have to provide receipts, and it’s limited to a year’s worth of loss,” Mr. Kwan said of the Ontario system. “Let’s say you move from one apartment to another and the difference in rent is $1,000. You might get $12,000, because you’re limited to a year’s worth of compensation.” In practice, he said, it’s rare for the Landlord and Tenant Board to issue fines beyond $4,000.
So far, Mr. Klassen hasn’t budged, though he says he and his partner would be open to moving. “With the rent prices now it’s hard to find anything comparable to what we have. If we find something, we’d take it,” he said. His landlords have offered to find him alternate housing but so far have not come through.
“We set up a meeting to go over our options,” Mr. Klassen said. When his landlords offered him $1,000, he countered by asking for $20,000. The landlords declined and, Mr. Klassen said, began trying new methods of dislodging him.
“They had changed the name and address to where the rent goes and they didn’t send an official e-mail,” he said. “They didn’t accept my rent, and said I had sent it to a sister company and here’s an N4 for not paying your rent,” he added, referring to a rent non-payment notice. “They gave me the runaround and never gave me my money back.”
Mr. Klassen’s negotiating strategy could work in certain cases, according to Geordie Dent, executive director of the Federation of Metro Tenants’ Associations, in Toronto. “I talked to a tenant who was trying to get a couple thousand dollars from a landlord for moving, and we gave them advice to not sell themselves short,” he said. “The tenant asked for $12,000, and the landlord approved it.”
Although Mr. Dent thinks the negotiated amount in that instance was fair, he noted that it wasn’t much, considering the cost of housing. “It will run out pretty quick in today’s rental market,” he said.
The biggest financial and emotional pitfalls for tenants trying to dispute bad-faith evictions arise from a process that is anything but straightforward.
“An N12 form itself tells you your tenancy is ending, and only on the second page does it explain that you don’t have to move out, and you have the right to contest this situation,” Mr. Kwan said.
While tenants disputing landlord malfeasance can represent themselves, many seek legal advice because of the complexity of the process.
Low-income tenants do have access to free legal clinics. “But the income cutoff for free advice is very short, and a vast number of people don’t qualify,” Mr. Dent said.
There are hidden costs, too, like the time commitment required for legal proceedings. This can mean lost wages for tenants.
But the costs of not disputing a wrongful eviction can also be substantial. “If you want to live in a similar unit, you have to move to somewhere outside of your community, you’d have to find new local schools and consider transportation,” Mr. Kwan said. “There are lots of costs associated with not asserting your rights.”
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