The community organization Vivre en ville is launching its own rent register today, in which the monthly amount paid by tenants of more than 15,400 housing units in Quebec has already been entered. The objective, however, is for the Government of Quebec and the municipalities to adopt this tool so that it no longer depends on the goodwill of citizens to register their rent on it.
“Unlike previous initiatives, this register has an administrative capacity,” said Adam Mongrain, director of housing files for Vivre en ville, during a technical meeting held in downtown Montreal on Thursday morning. This register of rents, for the moment supplied by citizens, was thus designed to receive administrative data available to public authorities, such as the RL-31 slip provided by tenants as part of their tax return.
The organization claims to have already started a discussion with certain cities in Quebec as well as with the Legault government in the hope of convincing them to adopt this rent register, the creation of which benefited from financial support of 2.7 million from Canada Mortgage and Housing Corporation. Funding for the operation of the site will be provided by the Centraide organization and the Laval public health department.
The hosting and security of the data included in this register are also provided at least until December 2028 by a private company that offers a cloud computing environment that meets government standards, says Vivre en ville. Thus, the adoption of this tool by cities or Quebec could be done at “zero cost”, indicates Adam Mongrain.
“We have until 2028 to demonstrate that the housing crisis hurts everyone. And that we must seize every opportunity to tackle it,” adds Mr. Mongrain.
The City of Montreal also supports the “solid and comprehensive” initiative of Vivre en ville, which it is open to using as part of the application of its “responsible owner” certification, which will apply to some of the residential buildings in the metropolis. “That said, this partial solution cannot replace a national register for all rental housing” in the province, adds in writing the head of housing on the executive committee, Benoit Dorais, thus returning the ball to Quebec.
In October 2021, the Minister of Municipal Affairs and Housing, Andrée Laforest, argued that such a rent register project would cost the government too much to justify Quebec City’s decision not to go ahead with it. such an initiative.
Joined by The duty, the current Minister of Housing, France-Élaine Duranceau, “welcomed” the initiative of Vivre en ville. “If they think they’ve arrived at a solution that won’t cost much, that will provide information that’s relevant, that’s fair and that’s verified, fine,” she said, without commit to having the government institutionalize this platform. However, the minister assures that she will meet “soon” with the organization to discuss this project.
Rapid rise in rents
This announcement comes at a time when a Léger survey, commissioned by Vivre en ville, shows that when tenants in Quebec move, their rent increases by an average of $145 per month, or about 18%. The survey, conducted among 5,550 tenants in the province, also indicates that 80% of them are not aware that clause G of their lease is supposed to indicate the lowest price paid for their accommodation in course of the last 12 months. They often find themselves accepting rent beyond their financial means, and much higher than that paid by the tenant who occupied the premises before them.
“Our level of poverty and homelessness are increasing due to the housing crisis,” said the director general of Vivre en ville, Christian Savard, at a press conference. To tackle this major problem, a series of measures will have to be taken by the public authorities, he recalled. “Most of the solutions come from the government, but we got our hands dirty for one of them” by creating this rent register, he continued.
Such a register, “it will discourage the logic of replacing tenants with higher-paying tenants by providing information that will have an anti-speculative effect,” added Mr. Mongrain. In other words, the tool could help reduce evictions of tenants paying rent below market value, he said.
Léger’s probe also made it possible to collect information concerning a third of the rents currently in the register. The other data there comes from an old rent register from a citizens’ initiative. However, citizens will no longer be able to register their rent themselves if this project is taken over by the government, since the information on rents will then be taken from administrative documents.