B.C. Housing Minister Ravi Kahlon, pictured on Feb. 6 in Victoria, says he's asked the province’s housing enforcement team to reach out to the landlord and to make sure all the rules of the Residential Tenancy Act are being followed.CHAD HIPOLITO/The Canadian Press
Tenants of a B.C. apartment building are being asked to agree to double-digit rent hikes or risk losing their home, and under provincial tenancy rules, there’s not much they can do about it.
Some renters at Winsome Place Apartments in Surrey received a letter from their landlord in late April saying if they don’t agree to a rent increase, their unit could be up for sale by July 1.
“It’s very difficult right now. We make a lot of payments. We have different things to pay during the month,” said Vivyan Eassa, 51, who has lived at Winsome Place since 2009.
The B.C. government placed a 2-per-cent cap on rent increases this year, up from 1.5 per cent in 2022. However, landlords can raise the rent beyond the cap if they have the written permission of the tenant.
Robert Patterson, a lawyer with Tenant Resource and Advisory Centre who has been working with the tenants at Winsome Place, said landlords can also sell a unit if they want to.
“This is sort of two things that the landlord is allowed to do. When you put them together, it just makes it seem highly improper,” he said.
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B.C. Housing Minister Ravi Kahlon said he’s asked the province’s housing enforcement team to reach out to the landlord and to make sure all the rules of the Residential Tenancy Act are being followed, and he encouraged the tenants to educate themselves about their rights.
But he acknowledged: “Anyone has the right to sell their home if they choose to.”
“We continue to look at legislation to try to find ways of how we can better support tenants in these types of situations,” Mr. Kahlon said. He added that while most B.C. landlords are ethical, “this is an example of that there are bad apples out there,” Mr. Kahlon said.
Mr. Patterson noted that even if a tenant agrees to the increase, there’s no way the tenant can stop the landlord from selling the unit anyway.
“I think it highlights some sort of failures of our current legislation to protect tenants,” he said.
Because Winsome Place Apartments is a stratified building – each unit has its own title and can be sold individually – it’s more likely there will be people who want to move into the unit, Mr. Patterson added.
“If you’re selling unit by unit, the person who buys that individual unit is much more likely to want to occupy it,” he said. “The threat is more real.”
David Hutniak, chief executive officer of LandlordBC, a non-profit organization that represents owners and managers of rental housing in British Columbia, said while he understands tenants are struggling with the increases, he has sympathy for the landlord, too.
“All our costs have gone through the roof,” Mr. Hutniak said. “It’s challenging for renters, and it’s challenging for landlords.”
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The letter to tenants says costs such as property taxes, waste disposal, trade costs and utilities have gone up beyond the government increases, so the building has to increase its revenue.
Ms. Eassa said she and her family pay $1,063 a month to rent their two-bedroom apartment. Her letter said their rent would increase by $378 a month, about a 35-per-cent hike. In previous years, it has increased by around $15 or $20, Ms. Eassa said.
Despite the increase, she said she’ll continue living in the apartment. “What can I do? Every rent is so high.”
The landlord of Winsome Place Apartments did not respond to The Globe and Mail’s requests for comment.