House sale delayed as tenant ‘milked the system’, landlord alleges
Andrew Duffy
Western Investor
A landlord says the new owners of this house in Victoria had to stay in a hotel and store their furniture for weeks while the tenant disputed the eviction. | Adrian Lam, Times Colonist
Landlord claims the sale of Victoria property held up by a tenant who made “frivolous” allegations to get rent-free time
A Victoria landlord says it’s time for an overhaul of the dispute-resolution process for landlords and tenants after fighting for weeks to evict a tenant in order to close the sale of his house.
Liam McGowan said the sale of his Fairfield property was held up by a tenant who milked the system for all the rent-free time he could get.
“It was a disaster — this guy played the system all the way,” said McGowan. He said he went through all the required steps once a purchase offer was accepted, but the tenant refused to leave.
On Oct. 28 of last year, the tenant was advised the house was sold and he would have to be out by Jan. 1, 2022.
McGowan said the tenant, who had been in the home since October 2019, paying $3,500 per month in rent on a month-to-month basis, disputed the eviction on the grounds he’d overheard the new owners suggesting they were going to renovate, which he took to mean they were going to rent the house out. If that was the case, he could not be evicted.
He knew that would delay the [transaction], but he submitted no evidence to the Residential Tenancy Branch,” said McGowan. That initially delayed the sale for a month. After an arbitrator found in favour of McGowan, the tenant applied for a review, further delaying the process.
The new owners provided statements to the Residential Tenancy Branch saying the only renovations would be for their own comfort and that the Fairfield home was to be their principal residence.
“There seems to be no consequence for bringing any dispute to the branch, even when they are frivolous and unfounded like this one,” said McGowan. “All he had to do is suggest that there’s new evidence and everything stops again. And there’s no consequence for that.”
The tenant did finally move out and the new owners, who are from Kelowna, are expected to take possession soon.
But McGowan notes the move was supposed to happen more than a month earlier, and the new owners have had to pay to store their furniture and stay in a hotel for weeks.
McGowan was also forced to reduce the selling price of the home and had the closing date moved to the start of February, while the tenant lived at the home rent-free during the process.
“And you know what, this is not unusual,” said McGowan. “Something has to change.”
Hunter Boucher, director of operations at Landlord B.C., said while the process isn’t perfect, the legislation is relatively balanced and the change that needs to occur is in the wait time for resolution of disputes like McGowan’s.
“The problem is timely access to justice. With the significant wait times, landlords and tenants are denied that,” he said. “And when you have a situation where you may be waiting two, three or four months for a hearing to find out whether or not you are going to receive an order of possession, or whether that notice and tenancy is going to be upheld, that has a significant amount of impact on people.”
The ministry responsible for the Residential Tenancy Branch says it is working to improve wait times and streamline systems to reduce decision delays in the face of a surge in the number of disputes.
In a statement, the Ministry of the Attorney General said the branch is dealing with a 17 per cent increase in dispute applications each month.
The ministry said the dispute-resolution process is intended to resolve issues where one party is not upholding their obligations under the Residential Tenancy Act, adding that until the file is reviewed by an arbitrator, it can be difficult to determine whether a dispute has merit.
“We acknowledge the stress this puts on landlords and tenants who are waiting for a resolution and are actively looking for ways to address circumstances where one party files a dispute to take advantage of these delays.”
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