07/05/2024
🔥 Hot off the Press!
Big news for tenants & landlords wanting to sell their tenanted properties!
The provincial government is introducing what they are calling “tenant protections.” But it really looks like they are trying to penalize landlords.
Requiring landlords to give 4 months notice will make their properties undesirable and hard to sell, because of the long closing period.
Sellers will need to contact the listing agent in July if they want the sale proceeds by January (if the requirement requires 4 full months to vacate upon sale).
And buyers would be hurt by the unintended consequences, as their mortgage rate-holds expire after 4 months.
Having to get a second mortgage rate-hold means buyers could face unexpected, higher monthly payments at closing.
And this means that first time buyers might need to become landlords for short periods of time before moving in themselves.
Acting as a landlord for two months may cost buyers a few thousand dollars more, if they’re subsiding the unit before moving in.
Another loser from today’s announcement is the BC taxpayer.
Presumably, the government will now need to staff a new bureaucracy to oversee and enforce their new website. (hopefully, it’s nothing like the Arrive-Can app which cost taxpayers $27 million).
Don’t get me wrong— I’m all for reasonable tenant protections. I was once evicted by a landlord using the “fixed-term” trick on me.
When I first moved to BC more than a decade ago, a Building Manager offered me a fixed-term lease, and promised to renew it the following year—only to renege and force me out.
🥲
Annoyed at first, I didn’t dwell on it. I moved on, and things worked out for the best.
The current notice period of 90 days is sufficient for a tenant to find new accommodations.
I rented 12 (give or take) apartments/accommodations in my 20s and 30s (including Japan, Australia, and Mexico), and I don’t believe it ever took more than 2 to 3 weeks to find one.
In a nutshell, I believe the new changes are unnecessary, as they add a layer of bureaucratize and make things more complicated. (Not to mention the hidden costs to all of us)
If you’re curious to learn more about how the new “protections” could apply to you, check out our quick notes below.
Quick notes:
- Starting July 18, 2024, landlords will be required to use the Landlord Use Web Portal when they are issuing Notices to End Tenancy for personal or caretaker use, with a unique notice ID when ending a tenancy.
- Landlords will need to give 4 months notice instead of 2 months.
- The person moving into the home must occupy it for a minimum of 12 months and landlords who evict in bad faith could be ordered to pay the displaced tenant 12 months’ rent.
- Tenants will have 30 days to dispute Notices to End Tenancy instead of the current 15 days.
A new website launching on July 18, 2024, will better protect renters from being evicted in bad faith and bring improvements to the process for landlords.
