Economic Evictions in Canada
Economic evictions are on the rise across Canada, leading to increased rates of displacement and homelessness. In some cases, economic evictions happen when renters are formally or informally evicted from their homes because they cannot afford the rent.
Competition in a tight rental market and a growing gap between rent costs and incomes often contribute to renters’ inability to keep up with rent prices. In addition to evictions for unpaid rent or arrears, economic evictions also encompass profit-motivated evictions such as renovation and demolition-related evictions (also known as renovictions and demovictions), as well as bad-faith evictions for a landlord’s own use (e.g., claiming a landlord or their relative requires the rental unit).
In 2021, seven per cent of Canadians and 12.5 per cent of renters had experienced an eviction at some point in their life. While rent arrears was the most common reason for economic evictions in the early 2000s, now, nearly 65 per cent of renters who experienced an eviction lost their homes because of landlord factors (also known as no-fault evictions). Recent studies show that landlord’s own use and sale of the property are the most common reasons for no-fault evictions. Meanwhile, between four and ten per cent of evictions are carried out to demolish, convert, or extensively renovate the property.
The rise and sheer volume of no-fault evictions are symptomatic of an increasingly financialized housing market. While there are instances when landlords might legitimately need to repossess their rental property to sell it, move in, or undertake necessary renovations, no-fault evictions are often profit-driven, particularly in Ontario, British Columbia, Prince Edward Island, and Nova Scotia.
Renovictions in Ontario
In Ontario, vacancy decontrol, the 2018 rent control exception, and the improper use of above-guideline increases (AGIs) are also key factors driving economic evictions, by rendering rents unaffordable. With vacancy decontrol, rents are tied to the renter, not the unit. This means that when there is a change of renters, landlords can charge whatever rent the market will bear. Similarly, the 2018 rent control exception allows landlords with rental units first occupied after November 15, 2018, to raise rents without limit each year. AGIs allow landlords to recover the costs of capital expenses and tax increases by passing those costs onto renters. All three measures allow landlords to raise rents significantly by bypassing the annual rent increase guideline.
In the absence of vacancy control, landlords are incentivized to evict long-term renters. Under the Residential Tenancies Act (RTA), landlords can terminate a tenancy if the unit needs to be vacated for demolition, conversion, or extensive renovations. Still, renters have the right of first refusal to return to their unit after the renovations are completed and pay the same rent. Bad-faith renovictions occur when landlords exploit loopholes in the legislation to circumvent these legal obligations. Once a renter is evicted, landlords can take advantage of vacancy decontrol to turn over the unit to a new renter at a much higher rent, sometimes without completing any substantial renovations.
A recent report from ACORN found that between 2017 and 2021, eviction notices for renovation, demolition or conversion (N13s) increased by 300 per cent in Ontario, with the highest number of filings in Toronto. However, these figures likely underestimate the scale of the issue, as most renoviction cases never reach the Landlord and Tenant Board (LTB).
This is because landlords who use renovations as a pretext to evict renters often deploy other tactics to avoid having the eviction challenged at the LTB. These tactics include offering cash for keys, misleading renters about their rights, harassing and intimidating renters, neglecting repairs, or conducting disruptive renovation works. If an eviction notice is filed at the LTB, renters can dispute the N13 if they can provide evidence that the landlord did not intend to do the renovations or that the landlord did not allow them to return to their unit once the renovations were completed. Nevertheless, many renters choose not to challenge an eviction, whether formal or informal, for various reasons: they may not want to stay in unlivable conditions, they might have limited knowledge of their rights and available supports, or they may not have the time and resources to dispute an eviction.
As a result, many households are displaced from their communities, and segregated into poorly resourced areas far away from socio-economic opportunities. In some cases, renovictions can also lead to homelessness. Amongst the groups most impacted by renovictions are low-income households, immigrants and newcomers, racialized people, Indigenous people, single parents, people with disabilities, and people experiencing mental health or substance use issues. Enduringly low vacancy rates and a drastic loss of affordable rental units mean that evicted renters often end up living in lower quality and more expensive housing, with the majority forced into situations of visible and hidden homelessness.
Effectiveness of Anti-Renoviction Bylaws
Municipalities can use their regulatory powers to close legal loopholes that enable renovictions by enforcing conditions under which extensive renovations can be undertaken and strengthening renter protections during the renovation process.
1. Pioneering anti-renoviction bylaws in B.C.
New Westminster, British Columbia, was the first Canadian municipality to adopt an anti-renoviction bylaw. In response to numerous complaints regarding renovictions, the City initially implemented a Renovictions Action Plan focused on renter education and information. Under the Action Plan, renters were better supported in reporting and disputing a renoviction. However, the onus was on renters to prove that the eviction was carried out in bad faith to stop a renoviction.
The first iteration of New Westminster’s anti-renoviction policy did little to curb renovictions, so the City decided to amend its Business License Bylaw for rental housing in 2019. The new bylaw required landlords to provide various development permits as proof that the rental unit needed to be vacated to undertake renovations, or that it was unsafe for a renter to remain in the unit. In addition, landlords were required to provide temporary accommodation to renters during renovations or enter a new tenancy agreement under comparable or better conditions than the existing agreement. Once renovations were completed, renters could return to their unit at the same rent and landlords had to issue a statement to an inspection unit confirming the previous rent paid. If landlords did not comply with these requirements, they could be fined or risk losing their rental housing business license.
Shifting the burden of proof onto landlords and introducing locally-based monitoring and enforcement mechanisms proved to be very effective in eliminating renovictions in New Westminster compared to renter education programs alone. By the end of 2021, the City had nullified these amendments, as the provincial government integrated these protections into the Residential Tenancy Act. While amendments to provincial legislation ensure that all renters in the province enjoy the same protections, the continuing and concerning increase in rates of renovictions in British Columbia could point to a lack of effectiveness in enforcing these protections.
2. Adapting the B.C. model in Ontario municipalities
Based on the success of the New Westminster bylaw, several municipalities in Ontario have adopted or are in the process of developing their own anti-renoviction bylaws.
In response to a staggering 983 per cent increase in renovictions between 2017 and 2022, Hamilton was the first Ontario municipality to adopt an anti-renoviction bylaw, which came into effect on January 1, 2025. Renter protections under this new bylaw are very similar to those in New Westminster’s:
- Landlords are required to obtain a renovation license shortly after issuing a N13 notice, which must be renewed annually.
- Landlords must secure all building permits prior to the eviction, and must provide an engineer’s report explaining why the unit must be vacated.
- Landlords are required to provide temporary accommodation comparable to the unit being vacated, or adequate compensation for renters to temporarily move during renovations.
- Renters have the right of first refusal and can return to their unit once renovations are completed, at the same rent.
- Landlords found in non-compliance can face hefty daily fines, with additional fees for repeated non-compliance.
London also adopted an anti-renoviction bylaw in September 2024, which came into force in March 2025. However, some of the requirements under this bylaw are weaker than those under Hamilton’s. For example, landlords are not required to provide temporary accommodation or financial compensation to renters during renovations. Instead, they must provide renters with a Tenant Information Package that outlines renters’ rights during a renoviction.
Toronto shortly followed suit with its Rental Renovation License Bylaw, which was adopted in November 2024 and came into effect on July 31, 2025. In addition to similar protections as those afforded under Hamilton’s anti-renoviction bylaw, Toronto’s bylaw includes measures such as requiring landlords to pay moving expenses on top of temporary accommodation or rent gap compensation for the duration of the renovations, monitoring landlord compliance through an online public registry, and providing legal education and resources to renters on the City’s website.
Other Ontario municipalities are also exploring the feasibility of implementing anti-renoviction bylaws. Ottawa, Kitchener, and Mississauga are currently in the process of developing these bylaws, which will likely be considered for adoption at the start of 2026.
Next steps
Preventing bad-faith renovictions starts with requiring proof of good faith from the evicting, not the evicted, party. Currently, the RTA places the burden of proof onto renters, and there are crucial gaps around proactive enforcement of renter protections, such as respecting renters’ right to return to their home and providing adequate compensation for relocation.
In an encouraging move, the provincial government passed Bill 97, the Helping Homebuyers, Protecting Tenants Act, in 2023, which introduced several amendments to the RTA to better prevent renovictions. The proposed changes would help fill those gaps by requiring landlords to submit a report from a qualified professional to justify the need for vacating the unit, inform renters that they have the right of first refusal, notify renters of the estimated date by which rental units are expected to be ready for occupancy following renovations and of any changes or delays, and provide a grace period for renters to move back.
The proposed changes have yet to come into effect and some gaps remain around protecting renters’ security of tenure. Mainly, the necessity to vacate a rental unit for renovations should not require the termination of a lease. As noted above, vacancy decontrol creates a strong incentive for landlords to terminate a tenancy under the guise of conducting renovations to charge higher rents to new renters. As it currently stands, they can easily deny a renter’s right of first refusal and instead choose to pay the limited compensation prescribed under the RTA, which is one to three months’ rent, depending on the size of the rental building.
Long-term renters usually pay rents below average market rents, and that level of compensation is woefully insufficient to help them find a comparable unit. Landlords have an obligation to maintain their rental units in good condition, and renovations and building upgrades should be part of that obligation. As such, tenancies should not end during renovations and the RTA should be further amended to ensure that landlords provide temporary housing and relocation support during renovations.
In addition, the standard of proof required to justify vacancy for renovations is not rigorous enough. As the authority regulating building and development permits, municipalities have an important role to play in bridging that gap by establishing a clear, objective, and independent standard of proof as it relates to building maintenance and upgrades. While it is too soon to tell how effective municipal anti-renoviction bylaws are (or will be) at preventing bad faith renovictions, in principle, these bylaws are strengthening renter protections by requiring more accountability from landlords. In this sense, municipal governments play an essential part in ensuring renters’ security of tenure and the preservation of housing affordability by offering an additional layer of safeguards. It will be interesting to see over time how the Ontario model compares to the B.C. one in terms of protections and enforcement mechanisms, and whether renoviction prevention is better carried out by provincial governments, municipal governments, or both.
About CCHR:
The Canadian Centre for Housing Rights (CCHR) is Canada’s leading registered charitable organization working to advance the right to adequate housing. For over 35 years, we have worked tirelessly at the intersection of human rights and housing, providing free services to renters facing evictions and human rights violations to remain housed, providing education and training about housing rights across Canada, and advancing rights-based housing policy through research, policy development, advocacy, and law reform.
