"Ripped off by problematic tenants": Landlord behind petition says laws don't favour them
A member of the landlord group petitioning for changes to BC’s residential tenancy laws says he’s motivated by peers who’ve lost money dealing with difficult tenants.
The online petition has more than 2,000 signatures. Its asks include speeding up Residential Tenancy Branch decisions, looser rent controls, reintroducing fixed-term leases, and a pool of money landlords can collect from if tenants fail to pay rent.
“We heard too many stories in the past that too many landlords have concerns about being ripped off by problematic tenants,” member Baldeep Jhand with the Landlord Rights Association of BC told Daily Hive. “And the tenancy board is taking way too much time.”
Jhand himself hasn’t dealt with problem tenants and has been renting out two units in his home for years. He views his efforts to help fellow landlords as community service. He believes residential tenancy laws currently favour tenants and wants landlords to have more tools to feel comfortable renting their suites.
The petition asks are as follows:
- Quicker RTB decisions during evictions
- Re-introducing fixed-term leases
- Higher cap for yearly rent increases
- Raising long-term tenants’s monthly price to market rent
- Provincially-funded rent relief pool for landlords who can’t recover money from tenants
- Publish RTB decisions
- Enabling landlords to evict with police assistance, instead of hiring a court bailiff
- Expanding the close family member definition
- Shortening eviction notice requirements and lengthening ending tenancy notice requirements
- Allow landlords to serve eviction notices via text or social media message
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In response to the landlords’ petition, a Ministry of Housing spokesperson told Daily Hive the RTB has added 50 new positions to ensure timely resolution of disputes. In addition, there’s a fast-tracked hearing stream for landlords to request an Order of Possession for unpaid rent when the tenant has disputed the Notice to End Tenancy.
Earlier this month, the RTB expanded its direct request process to allow landlords to get an Order of Possession more quickly when a tenant hasn’t disputed their eviction.
Direct requests used to be limited to unpaid rent and utilities, but are now available for with-cause evictions. The Housing Ministry estimates this could save up to 2,000 hearing spots per year.
In addition, when it comes to unpaid rent, landlords can already apply to the RTB for compensation.
Rent control in BC caps the maximum yearly increase for tenants staying in the same unit. This year it was capped at 3.5%, which is lower than inflation for the second year in a row. As inflation returns to normal levels in the coming years, the Housing Ministry plans to allow rent increases in line with cost of living increases, the spokesperson said.
The government also confirmed it has no plans to reintroduce fixed-term leases, which were outlawed in 2017 to protect renters against massive rent hikes at the end of the lease.
A lawyer with BC’s Tenant Resource Advisory Centre spoke to Daily Hive Tuesday about the petition, saying landlords’ desire for security of their investment needs to be balanced against tenants’ need for secure and affordable housing.
“Housing seems to be the only class of investment where people who invest in it have this assumption that they should never face a loss,” Robert Patterson said. “If a bunch of shareholders were to go to the government and say, ‘Well, the value of our shares have gone down and we’d like public funding to make up for it,’ I think they’d get laughed out of town.”
He doesn’t think tenants should be able to be evicted with a simple text message, or that rent controls should be loosened. He also cautioned against making RTB decisions public, which may prompt future landlords to blacklist tenants who (rightfully) file disputes with a previous landlord.
As for adding back fixed-term leases or allowing years-long tenancies to be jacked up to market rent? He says those are a “recipe for mass eviction and homelessness.”
“People’s right to live in their community and have safe, secure, and affordable housing has to trump the ability to make money on an investment,” Patterson said. “Because it’s ultimately transferring more money from those who have less to those who have more.”
“Unaware of this petition”: LandlordBC
LandlordBC, a longstanding organization supporting British Columbian landlords with tenancy documents, procedures, and marketing, told Daily Hive it had no knowledge of the group Landlord Rights Association of BC or its petition.
LandlordBC is currently advocating for the government to build more rental housing to help vulnerable renters, and Hutniak said he couldn’t comment on the other asks contained within the other landlord group’s petition.
“These are challenging times for both tenants and landlords. It is our view that government has a critical role in balancing the wants and needs of both renters and landlords so that we have a healthy rental housing ecosystem,” CEO David Hutniak said.