Nothing is going right in the middle of the house. Pressed by a bubbling market, tenants, owners and builders agree on one thing: the laws must be better applied, even reviewed. But where to start ?
The last few decades have been marked by several housing crises, particularly in the early 1980s and at the turn of the 2000s. To have to the former spokesperson for the Popular Action Front in urban redevelopment from 1979 to 2016 and author of several books, François Saillant.
“Before that, we simply lacked housing,” he says. However, “the housing shortage we are experiencing today is even worse than during the 1970s and 1980s”, because it is added to several other problems, such as the rapid rise in property values, the popularity of rental in the short term on platforms such as Airbnb and the phenomenon of evictions and housing repossessions for speculative purposes.
A gloomy portrait also painted by professor in the Department of Urban and Tourism Studies at the University of Quebec in Montreal (UQAM) and housing specialist Hélène Bélanger. “The situation seems to have been getting worse for a long time. We really have a housing crisis, both in terms of availability and prices. And it looks worse this year, ”notes the expert.
In this context, stories of fraudulent evictions are piling up in Quebec, thus increasing the pressure on the Legault government. In particular, the City of Montreal is calling for changes to the Civil Code of Quebec in order to remove the landlord’s right to evict tenants to subdivide a dwelling, enlarge it or change its use.
A badly applied Civil Code
However, before thinking of modifying the Civil Code, it would be necessary to begin by applying it properly, since it already provides for several measures to protect the rights of tenants, affirm the experts contacted by The duty. One of its articles provides in particular that a dwelling that has been repossessed or evicted “cannot be rented or used for a purpose other than that for which the right was exercised” – for example to house a member of the immediate family there – “without the authorization of the court”. If a landlord decides to rent a dwelling after having evicted his tenant, he must first obtain authorization from the Administrative Housing Tribunal (TAL), which “fixes the rent”, we can read. A section of law that is often overlooked by landlords.
“The law is protective”, but it is poorly applied, notes Martin Gallié, who is a professor at UQAM and a specialist in housing law. “The Wild West [en habitation], it is because there is no public control of a general nature”, estimates the expert. In order to better regulate evictions and repossessions of housing, Quebec could send inspectors to systematically check that these are carried out for reasons provided for by law, under penalty of high fines, proposes Mr. Gallié.
Conversely, currently, for the rare owners who carry out fraudulent evictions and who are declared guilty by the TAL, the punitive and moral damages that they must give to the tenants “are not dissuasive”, notes Mme Bélanger, who therefore believes that these should be revised upwards.
On the legal level, Martin Gallié proposes that the judges of the TAL apply “a principle of proportionality” in their decisions. Thus, they would be called upon to take into account the repercussions of the evictions on the tenants concerned before authorizing them. An approach that could, according to the expert, avoid “chain evictions” of tenants who have not been able to pay their rent on time.
“We do not realize how far the judgments have considerable repercussions, not only for the people expelled, but in society in general, with repercussions in the chain, supports Mr. Gallié. It’s serious. »
Increase the offer, but still?
To counter the shortage, governments are insisting that supply must be increased and they are multiplying announcements to build social housing. However, there has never been so much housing built, according to the Association of Construction and Housing Professionals of Quebec (APCHQ). We even broke a new record of 35,000 rental housing starts in 2021.
“It is certain that we must increase the offer in certain sectors, but the system of supply and demand is not enough”, slice Mme Belanger. “There are a lot of constructions, there are housing units available, but there are no affordable units among those that are available”, especially in Montreal, she notes.
What is currently being built in Quebec “does not meet the needs of low-income people”, also notes Mr. Saillant, who notes that these dwellings are largely “too expensive and too small” for families. More social housing is thus necessary, evokes Hélène Bélanger, the rent supplements offered by Quebec not being sufficient to meet all the needs, especially since this program stimulates rent increases, according to her.
The problem stems in part from the inability of many households to access property, says François Bernier, senior vice-president of public affairs at the APCHQ. This creates, he says, a ripple effect. “If we had worked on this in the past, we would have 100,000 more housing units available. To help young people become homeowners, we could notably create an intergenerational Home Buyers’ Plan (RAP) that would allow parents to dip into their RRSP to finance their child’s down payment, suggests the APCHQ.
Opposed to urban sprawl and in favor of densification, the association demands that it be given the means to build more by easing the regulations, but also by rethinking the municipal zoning of single-family homes so that it is possible everywhere to add a floor or an annex (in order to build bigenerational habitats, for example). A suggestion recently made in Ontario by the Affordable Housing Task Force. However, according to CBC analyst Mike Crawley, the Ford government rejected the idea for fear of alienating suburban landlords in the run-up to the election.
Homeowners also pay
The owners are also not at the end of their troubles, at a time when several boroughs of Montreal have greatly limited in recent years the subdivision and reunification of housing, among other things, thus complicating the life of several young families in lack of space. Conversions of rental units into divided co-ownerships are also prohibited in Montreal, which forces many owners to opt for undivided co-ownerships, notes lawyer specializing in co-ownership law Ludovic Le Draoullec.
“It’s not in the public interest, frankly,” says Mand Le Draoullec, since the maintenance of the “real estate heritage” is more assured in the long term in the buildings of divided co-ownerships, which are supervised by a syndicate of co-ownership.
“Basically, the method of setting rents needs to be changed, to make the market more attractive and so that the renovations can be reimbursed by the owners”, notes for his part the director general of the Corporation of property owners of Quebec, Benoit Sainte-Marie. This is the only way to ensure “the quantity and quality of housing” on the rental market, he says.
“Above all, we must encourage the ownership of rental housing and ensure that it is a profitable activity, otherwise the whole question of property will suffer,” adds Mr. Ste-Marie.
Housing Minister Andrée Laforest was unavailable to speak to the To have to within the framework of this file.
With Isabelle Porter