Ontario's Affordable Housing Crisis Deepens

Ontario's Affordable Housing Crisis Deepens according to Laurie Monsebraaten Social justice reporter, in today's Toronto Star.

I've already left a couple of comments on the article, for all the good that will do ... but hey, why not a blog post as well?

It irks me that so much of what is written about the 'housing crisis' focuses so firmly on affordability ...and few seem at all inclined to look beyond that one issue. Of course, affordability IS an issue - but not simply in the way that it is presented here.

It is an issue for me that I cannot afford to offer people affordable housing because the systems in Ontario are so severely idiotic.

If I make a bad choice in who to rent to - or even, as in our most recent nightmare, a reasonable choice who then hooks up with a jerk (she, on her own, was a reasonable tenant - always late, but rent was paid, place was clean and well maintained ... it wasn't until he showed up that things got ugly...but unfortunately, landlords can neither predict nor prevent such things)- I can be on the hook for thousands of dollars.

That's not thousands of dollars in lost rental income, boys and girls... that's actual money out of my pocket.

That's thousands of dollars that I have to actually pay - to agencies like the LTB and Sheriff's Office and so on to do nothing useful.... to the hydro and gas and water and insurance and mortgage companies who all expect to be paid no matter what.... and to fix the damages angry deadbeats cause.  The lost rental income, that's extra and not included in the thousands of dollars my nightmare cost me.

And to add insult to injury, I still have to support these people through my taxes, even though I knew damn well that they were paying NOTHING for shelter (but still receiving their full shelter allowance) and he was working full time, as well.

My squatters cost me ONE THIRD of my GROSS income for last year. Not net income. Gross. And yeah, that is gross.  If I happen to wind up with more than 1 bad tenant in a year, I'm going to be working my butt off to pay their bills and my taxes (which they also benefit from)... and have not one red cent to pay my own bills.  How is that reasonable?

Our case is not unique.... drop by the Ontario Landlords Association forums and read for a bit and you'll see that these sorts of messes are happening in every part of the province. It's not just MY LTB office and Sheriff's Office that are filled with incompetent and uncaring people - it's everywhere.

Read some of the tenant activist sites too - they're a laugh riot. So many people so convinced that every single landlord is rolling in cash, and should be required to not only pay taxes to support them, but also pay through the nose to accommodate people's disabilities, bad financial choices, etc.... oh, and if we don't keep them in the style in which they like to live, they can go to the LTB and ask for rent abatements even for damages and issues THEY CAUSE and don't bother to let us know about.... lots of how-to's about that as well.  

Sure, we need more affordable housing in Ontario - but to expect landlords to provide it and then not provide landlords with any reasonable recourse to deal with problem tenants is utterly ridiculous. We support low income Ontarians through our taxes....  and now you want the rest of my income too? Seriously?

As I've posted before, there are things that could be done to immediately improve the situation without spending any additional money. But do you know what? I have written to housing critics, MPPs, party leaders, and reporters - and I can not get a single one of them to bother to respond, never mind to DO anything.

I've tried to engage some of those tenant activist types in meaningful discussions as well .... clearly ain't happening... they can't seem to wrap their heads around the concept of moving beyond making demands and name-calling.

It is all incredibly frustrating.

Ways to address problems that don't cost taxpayers more money?! What a totally ridiculous concept! That's not what we need!!! We need a housing bonus... increased shelter allowances.... more human rights laws to force landlords not to discriminate.... more public housing.... more more more always more money!!!

Yeah right.... Ontario must be like the landlords, eh.... rolling in cash with nothing better to do with it than throw it around.

Personally, I think that not one more red cent should go to solving the housing crisis - and homelessness crisis as well - until we have actually implemented the low/no-cost possibilities.

FIRST you do the (relatively) quick and easy fixes ... then if they don't work, you start throwing money at problems.

Ontario has not done that first step.

WHY is it so hard to implement solutions that don't cost money (at ALL levels of government)? Neoliberalism, my friends... if no one is going to make bunches of money off of something, what good is it? None, of course.

Neoliberal societies focus on money... the economy.... money, money, money. Not people, and certainly not solving problems. It's all about making money.

Implement my solutions, no one gets rich....  so why bother?

Sad, innit?


Oh here...decided to save you the hassle of going to look for my proposed low/no cost approaches to solve the issue of landlords discriminating (because we have to!) against people on government assistance:

1. notification to OW/ODSP workers re: rent not being paid = STOP paying shelter allowance pending resolution (so that at least that can be recovered once LTB gives order, and to reduce motivation to mess up, misuse the rent $$)
2. when rent paid directly to landlord by arrangement, landlord must be notified when that is going to stop (currently, tenants make one phone call to worker, and surprise, no more rent). Include consent for notification in the initial intent to rent.
3. retraining at LTB - specifically attitudinal adjustment re: justifying delays and other assorted nonsense because "you'll get an order" - they need to understand that an order is often meaningless. Also need to understand that by protecting the deadbeats, they are harming the majority of low income tenants who do pay their rent.
4. Sheriff's office needs retraining, as well - and either enough resources to carry out evictions in reasonable time frame, or end their monopoly - allow landlords to pay baliffs, off duty police officers, whatever.

Landlord Ordered to Pay Tenant $800K Over Bedbug Infestation

Landlord Ordered to Pay Tenant $800K Over Bedbug Infestation .... ouch!

Am very glad that things are not quite as litigious here in Ontario - being a landlord is plenty challenging enough without having to worry about this sort of thing...

We're fortunate in that we have never had a tenant with bed bugs. Nor are we likely to, since we do a pre-emptive spray each time there is a turnover. I don't understand why more landlords don't do that - especially in rooming homes... so much cheaper and so much less aggravation than waiting until there is a problem. 

Anyway .... hubby does treat bed bugs - usually on behalf of landlords, who are required to pay even when this is actually a totally ludicrous requirement.

It makes some sense, I guess, in multi-unit properties and rooming houses... but in single family homes, a bedbug infestation really has nothing whatsoever to do with the landlord.

Even more aggravating is the fact that effective treatment of bedbugs requires that the people who live in the unit cooperate - and many don't.

No skin off their nose if the landlords have to pay for repeated treatments because they don't do - or stop doing - what is needed.  And I suppose it's not surprising that people often don't want to let others know they have them - which, unfortunately, all too often contributes to more serious infestations, and contamination of more locations.

In any case, in the Maryland case, it sounds like the landlords were, in fact, remiss, in that they did not ensure the problem was properly dealt with - but more than $800k  in damages seems a ~tad~ extreme!

Nice job cleaning up the yard

Too Funny

DS found my blog and called and complained to the Midland Police (wrong police department for this area, hon... but thanks for letting me know where you are; good to know).

Have, at his request, fixed the one place where her actual name was included, which was, actually, in a direct quote from a police officer that actually knew her name - the one that called today had a different name for her, apparently.  Interesting - I suppose when one makes a habit of ripping people off, the use of a number of different names makes sense.

Funny how DS didn't have any hesitation to use our names to spread lies, but objects to having any of hers in any way associated with the truth, eh?  Funny - but again, not surprising.

Such a hater, I am :)

In response to a question about why it takes so long to get rid of bad tenants, posted in the Ontario Landlords' Association forum earlier this evening - or I guess yesterday evening, now, since it's 3:41 am (back hurts too much for sleeping), I replied that:

I don't know about other areas, but in ours, many of the delays are easily attributed to sheer stupidity and carelessness.

 

Oh, and to a total lack of shiving a git at both the Legalized Theft Board and the Sheriff's Office... cuz, you know... delays & costs don't matter because you'll "get an order" and that is supposed to mean something

.

My response hurted someone's feelings:

You know what, your are waaay TOO hostile, I explain the Legislation, I don't fuggin write it... I understand your frustration, and yep take alot of abuse from people like you... that's not saying I don't understand your frustration... I REALLY do, but don't kill the messenger o.k?

Since my comment was written in response to someone else's question and was not directed to this charming new participant who joined the forum to be helpful (but only if nobody says anything bad about the LTB and irks her because she takes it personally and she, apparently, thinks she is well within in her rights to show up in our forum and tell people what they are allowed to think/say cuz well, you know... she's the boss of the world, right?)  I hardly felt it worth responding to there... but I did offer to provide her with evidence re: stupid and careless.

She didn't take me up on it :)

But hey, this is my blog and I can write whatever I want here, right?

And since I can't sleep and can't focus enough to write coherent cover letters right now, figure I might as well blather on here for a bit and expand on my comment.

Examples of sheer stupidity & carelessness:

1. initial hearing set for the wrong location (i.e. someone didn't know which area of the province our town is in, and didn't bother to check - just arranged the hearing to be heard in Mississauga cuz that is where the application (correctly) was sent to).
2. when the tenant complained, the date and location was changed. No one, however, bothered to a/ ask for my consent to the change (as per their own supposed rules which only apply to landlords, not to tenants, obviously, in spite of what they actually say) or b/ ensure that we were notified. If I hadn't called them on another matter and if it hadn't actually come up in that conversation, I would have driven 2 hours one way for a hearing that had been cancelled. But hey, no worries...I am a landlord, therefore I am independently wealthy and can afford such nonsense, right?
3. When they did change the date, it was from a day that I could attend, i.e. a Monday, to a day when I could not, at least not without cancelling class for more than 80 students who are entitled to the instruction they pay for. Since, when I submitted my applications, I also included a polite letter explaining my limitations re: availability and even going so far as to include a copy of my official timetable, and since, although not as often, they DO hold hearings on other days of the week even in Hicksville, I really did not think it unreasonable to ask that they at least TRY to accommodate me. Not only did they refuse to do so, they went so far as to schedule our hearings on consecutive Thursdays. Rather than putting them altogether, they thought I would like to force my 80+ students to miss classes 3 weeks in a row.
4. It took repeated phone calls, tears, and finally an all-out tantrum before I was able to get someone to actually listen and - once I had obtained written consent from the squatters (because the landlord cannot change the hearing without consent; only tenants may do so) - to do something about it. Sort of.
5. But first, I had to fax in my request for rescheduling (at the very least put all 3 hearings on the same damn day and preferably NOT a Thursday). I did exactly I was directed - and the answer was NO. The person who was in charge of rescheduling refused to do so. She left a message on my answering machine telling me that since she had already rescheduled the hearing for "me" she would not do it again ("me" being the tenant, not me, of course). Oh, and by the way, they had not received my paperwork regarding the nonpayment of rent, so wouldn't be scheduling THAT one at all.  (Except that they had not only received it, they had sent it back to me with the hearing notices!!!!) 
6. Of course, when you call the LTB, you are calling their customer "service" centre (using the term very loosely) so I was not able to respond to her idiotic message directly. To add to my frustration, I got it when I got home on a Friday; the CS centre was closed and I got to stew about it all weekend. When I did call them on the Monday, it took 3 tries before I was able to get an agent who was actually capable of LISTENING rather than spewing nonsense straight from the website and totally unrelated to what I was saying. He bumped me to a manager, who did in fact, call me back as promised, and who was actually, compared to everyone else I had the misfortune of dealing with, quite helpful. She did agree that it was rather ridiculous to have 3 separate hearings on 3 consecutive weeks, and while she was not able to move us to a date that actually would work for me in terms of students, she would help me to mitigate the damage by moving it to a Tuesday and by writing a note to the adjudicator requesting that our case be heard as early as possible so that I could hopefully be freed up in time to teach at least the last couple of hours of my class. She also was able to sort out the problem of the supposedly missing but not really application so that that issue would also be dealt with. But unfortunately all of this added weeks to the whole thing - every day of which cost us additional money & aggravation.

I've already written about most of the other assorted nonsense ... i.e. the fact that the adjudicator changed the order between telling us about it and writing it up ...  so won't detail all that again ... but it seems to me that the above nonsense contains more than enough evidence to support "stupid & careless" ... in fact, I should also have included "extremely biased against landlords" in my original comments now that I think about it :)

Just a little ~oopsie~ .... but not to worry....

.... the media release assures us that "no Ontario Works clients will be short-changed."  Of course not... the only parties likely to be short changed and never have a snowball's hope in hell of fixing it are the landlords - you know, the ones stupid enough to rent to anyone on assistance so that when it all goes to hell in a handbasket they're left out to dry with no help and no hope of recovery.

We FINALLY have a new tenant moving into the apartment the squatters were in... not on OW, thank goodness...

FINALLY might be able to breathe... pay bills... eat... all that good stuff...

and here we go again.

The tenants in our other house are, in fact, on direct pay. Don't know yet if we're affected - but you can be we won't be sleeping well until we find out.

But hey, no worries. No Ontario Works clients will be shortchanged.

And we landlords, well we just don't count for sh*t here in Ontario, do we? Clearly, that is exactly the case.

So ... now I've sent 2 emails to Kathleen Wynne, 1 to Andrea Horwath, and 2 to the ministry (2nd one just today) .... perhaps I should start a pool on when I'll get a response and from whom?

I am not holding my breath.

Have NEVER had such poor responses from politicians as I have since I began writing about Landlord Tenant issues ... interesting, hmmm?

Brighter Prospects?

Read a little bit of Ontario Report "Brighter Prospects" ...a report by the Commission for the Review of Social Assistance prepared by Commissioners Frances Lanken and Munir A. Sheikh.

Was looking, of course, specifically for what it says about housing in Ontario. Disappointing. Extremely so, in fact. This section of the report, on page 90 if you're interested, shows a total lack of understanding of WHY people on assistance are having difficulty accessing affordable housing.

Which is not surprising, as they apparently consulted with "stakeholders" -  i.e. people on assistance, most of whom have extremely limited understanding of why landlords refuse to rent to them, having rarely had the opportunity to be on the other side of the landlord-tenant relationship. My perspective - back when I was a single mother (albeit working, rather than on assistance) was very different than it is now that I am on the other side of the deal - I did not have a CLUE...

So it does not surprise me that the majority of low income people seeking housing don't get it.

The others who were provided the opportunity for input, however, should have done better.

Better yet, someone should have asked the landlords what the problem is and how to fix it. Because I'm sorry, but the recommendation that is offered will not do it. What they are suggesting is a housing benefit for not only those on assistance, but "all people with low-incomes." 

Guess what? We will still refuse to offer affordable housing to people on assistance. Those of us who have been burned - and all of those who haven't but have heard about our experiences and realize how easily it could happen to them - will continue to rent to people with jobs and NOT to people on OW/ODSP.  It doesn't matter how much money you give to people on assistance in Ontario for rent - it is not worth the risk, and we know it.

And you can cry discrimination and make laws against discrimination all you want - but the reality is that not all landlords are independently wealthy. Many, like me, cannot AFFORD to provide housing to people on assistance - because when it goes bad, it goes really, REALLY bad, and there is no help at all for us in Ontario. Everyone wants money - but no one actually DOES anything to help, at least not in any reasonable period of time.

The money that my last tenant-from-hell cost me was about 1/3 of my gross income for a year. Gross. Not net. How would YOU like to take a hit like that? Yeah, I thought not.

At least, if you rent to someone with a job and a good credit rating and it goes bad, you have some small hope of recovery. It might take a long time and a lot of hassle - but we will eventually likely get at least some of our money back.

If you rent to someone with neither of those things, when it goes bad, you get to pay hundreds and hundreds of dollars  - and continue to provide them with housing and all amenities for the months it takes to get them out - and for the damages they do during that time.... and you have ZERO chance of recovery at the end of it. Ever.

It is not even worth paying to file the order that the Legalized Theft Board will eventually give you against them ...which is a shame, as it means that the orders don't show up on their credit ratings so other people learn the hard way too....

We pay taxes which go to support people on OW and ODSP. Our taxes also support, presumably, the agencies which go out of their way to protect the poor helpless tenants against the big bad landlords - the Legalized Theft Board, the Sheriff's Office, the police, local by-law officials and so on ....

Guess what?

People don't get to be in the position of having money and credit to buy properties to rent by being stupid.

Chance of recovery vs no possibility of recovery - who would YOU rent to?

If the Commission for the Review of Social Assistance actually wanted to make recommendations to address the difficulties of finding housing for marginalized people they should talk to the landlords. Stop by the http://ontariolandlords.org/forum/  why don't you?

The problems CAN be fixed ... but not by giving low income people more money, sorry. Won't work.

There are some relatively simple measures which would drastically improve the situation ... but it seems that no one wants to hear them; most can't even be bothered to respond to emails.

I don't claim to have all the answers ...but I DO have suggestions:

• As soon as a landlord reports an issue with a tenant's rent to their OW/ODSP worker, their shelter allowance should be STOPPED pending resolution. Hold it in trust until the issue is resolved by the LTB, then distribute it as per the order
• individuals who have demonstrated their inability to manage their housing independently should be on direct pay (rent paid directly to landlords) AND required to provide 60 days notice to landlord and worker before shelter allowances can be redirected
• If you really feel the need to throw money at the problem, I would suggest that it would be better used to create a fund which could guarantee tenancies. For example, if my tenant has messed up and needs assistance to save their housing, the fund would pay the shortfall - and - so as to reduce abuse - require that they pay it back through a small monthly deduction. Expecting landlords to eat it every time a tenant doesn't pay their rent is not reasonable.
• The LTB needs an attitude adjustment. Their role is to implement the RTA - NOT to assist tenants to screw landlords and to provide worthless orders. There should be timelines for hearings - it is not reasonable to allow lengthy delays. And they should treat all parties with respect. Yes, even landlords.
• The Sheriff's Office is a joke. When evictions are ordered, they need to happen - even if it happens to be winter, or December, or someone's week off or what-the-hell-ever.  If the Sheriff's Office can't handle that, then end their monopoly; allow us to pay someone else to execute the order. And again - some training re: treating people with respect wouldn't hurt. I'd be happy to contribute to it through my taxes.