Whether a Landlord or a Tenant the perils of attendance before the Landlord Tenant Board are to a large extent the same, how to put forth your position in a clear and persuasive manner while at the same time conforming to the various and precise requirements of the Board.
As a landlord, you must remember that when rent is in arrears it is important to move quickly and efficiently through the system in that if you let the arrears accumulate you will be faced with the unpleasant reality that if your tenant cannot pay one month’s rent it is unlikely he or she will be unable to catch up two, three or four months rent arrears added to any delays existing in the Landlord-Tenant system.
The Landlord intended to seek an order for arrears and termination of the tenancy (and ‘L1’ application). However, the Landlord provided insufficient notice to the Tenant. The Notice to End a Tenancy Early for Non-payment of Rent (N4) was served on the Tenant February 28, 2017 and ought to have provided a termination date at least fourteen (14) days later. The N4 notice, however, included a termination date of March 8, 2017. As insufficient notice was provided to the Tenant, the Board is not able to consider termination of the tenancy. The Landlord was given the option to withdraw the application for termination of the tenancy on the basis of outstanding arrears. However, the Landlord chose to proceed with the application and requested and Order for the arrears only. Therefore, the only part of the application that proceeded was the claim for rent arrears. The order will be limited to rent arrears and costs only, not eviction Pursuant to s. 87(2), I also proceeded to hear the issues raised by the Tenant.
As outlined in the case outlined above any action for termination of a tenancy for non-payment of rent is subject to strict rules in respect to calculation of rent, service of Notices, dates of termination and calculation of alleged arrears and if there is any failure to meet these requirements a party no matter how prejudiced will have their application dismissed and be forced to start again enduring all the hardships or losses this delay may cause.
The Landlord and Tenant relationship can be complicated but it doesn’t have to be. Swift, effective resolution of issues makes for better, clearer relations. Attempting to tackle a Landlord-Tenant Board application on your own may end up negatively impacting the outcome of your matter and one small error could result in an action dismissed or worse.
At the Landlord and Tenant Board, our firm commences and defends actions involving unpaid rent, evictions, maintenance, illegal entry, harassment, and other LTB applications. The Landlord and Tenant Board resolve disputes between landlords and tenants through mediation or adjudication.
So if you find yourself in this type of situation schedule a time we can assist you in navigating the complex requirements of the Landlord Tenant Board and assist you in attempting to obtain your desired results.
