Toronto  Tenants  Rights

Save and print out this Tenant Poster in (Microsoft) MS Word format. If you are happy with the work of this web site it would be greatly appreciated if you were to put up one or more of these half-page posters, in your laundry room, community centre, grocery store or other bulletin board, to inform other tenants of this free web site. And yes, the bottom of the page needs a few cuts to separate the tags with the address of this web site. Thank you.

For the many people who have inquired as to how to contact them, click on the underlined title above.

Barbara Hurd

This is up from 1.5% for 2005.

Starting with 2005, the government removed the 2% bonus for landlords that had first been brought in under the Peterson Liberal government's Residential Rent Regulation Act of 1986.
30% of your rent is because of the annual 2% bonus given to landlords from 1987 to 2004. A 2% bonus over 18 years meant that rents went up 42.8% above inflation, to total 30% of regulated rents.

Tenants associations like the North Toronto Tenants Network, the West Lodge Toronto Tenants Association, and this web site, have been saying for years there should be no yearly government guideline setting minimum rent increases. Find out why in our (last yearly,) August 30, 2003, Press Release on Ontario rent increase guidelines. You can also read more on my Renters News and Social Justice Issues page.

Be sure to contact the Minister of Housing Hon. John Gerretsen to demand that there be a new tenant and landlord law with no guideline increase at all unless the landlord can justify it with expenses for necessary improvements and not unnecessary ones just as an excuse to jack up rents or ones necessary due to landlord neglect.

To see the Ministry's press release you can visit 2006 Rent Increase Guideline Released

If you are unhappy with the actions of the McGuinty government and the lack of tenants rights , you can download this poster about the Premier of Ontario Dalton McGuinty and his government's new tenant law.

They began their Residential Tenant Reform, with their Green Paper. They are claiming that "we want your views". You can find their web site at www.rentreform.ontario.ca.

They pretend to invite tenant input: "Have Your Say: The Tenant Protection Act", but, the McGuinty government tells us their version of the "facts." Then they provide us with a biased questionnaire. Even in their Town Hall meetings they are only giving tenants 2 minutes each to express what changes tenants need to the law to these poorly advertised events often located in areas inconvient for tenants.

Don't be fooled by their questionnaire! They ask: "6. In your opinion, how high should a region’s vacancy rate be before the government looks at removing rent controls?" They do not ask if rent controls should be removed or not, instead they are asking when would it be acceptable: "a) 3 per cent", "b) Higher than 3 per cent", or "c) No opinion/don’t know".

Guess where who sets the "vacancy rate"? Not the Government of Ontario! Not even CMHC, (Canada Mortgage and Housing Corporation). It is the landlords who are very well organized who set the vacancy rate when they report their claimed vacancies to CMHC. The landlords only have to simply report as many "vacancies" as necessary to CMHC and get the McGuinty government to remove rent control under this "Regional Decontrol" that was part of McGuinty's election platform.

Contact your MPP and demand that full rent control restored everywhere. Tell them we want more affordable housing, now. Let them know you will remember what their government did or did not do come the next election! And here is an interesting article on Greg Sorbara the Liberal Ontario finance minister.

You can find your MPP and how to contact them here Find your Ontario Member of Provincial Parliament, MPP.

You can also write letters to the editors of local newspapers and other media to express your concerns and opinions. Check out my Canadian media page, including direct links to write letters to the editors.

To view and sign it visit the Ontario Rent Roll Back Petition. The North Toronto Tenants Association first suggested on June 16, 1998, that to undo the devestation that would be caused by the Tenant Protection Act, only rolling back rents to those levels before the Act, would undo the damage done.

Toronto landlords have been lobbying heavily including distributing various full-colour pamphlets and now even a video to convince tenants to sign their petitions to keep the misnamed Tenant "Protection" Act, and attacking real rent regulation. That is why it is so important to support the Rent Rollback Petition to counter the landlords lobbying and misinformation.

Toronto Tenants pay over 3.7 times the property tax rates of house and condo owners, (on the municipally set portion). Is that fair? That means the average Toronto tenant pays about $2,500 a year in taxes, but as it is included in our rents most tenants are totally unaware of it. That difference in rates means that typical Toronto tenants pay an extra $100 to $180 a month in rent due to tax discrimination.

The City of Toronto's Finance Department is reviewing mill rates, that is the property tax rates, and it is time that tenants demanded tax fairness. Other cities such as London, Ottawa and Kingston have been slowly equalizing rates, but not Toronto. And if the City of Toronto were not even to have the same rate, but only to have the same ratio of tenant versus homeowner tax rates as cities such as Ottawa or London Ontario, the City of Toronto would be collecting an average of about $1,250 a year less per tenant household!

In addition to demanding that tax fairness for tenants be the rule in cities, we need to demand that the provincial law be changed to end vacancy decontrol where a landlord can raise the rent as much as they want when an apartment becomes vacant, because if taxes went down, the landlords could pocket the tax decrease by raising the rent that same amount to new tenants.

Read my analysis of this situation on City of Toronto Property Taxes on Apartments.

There will be a report on this issue to go to a meeting of the City of Toronto's Policy and Finance Committee, open to the public for deputations, on October 14, 2004, and then to go before Toronto City Council for some time and day between October 26 to 28, 2004. This issue has been on the backburner for years and it is expected the focus will be on retail and other business rates and will largely ignore tenants, as earlier the earlier City of Toronto reports have done.

I encourage you to express your opions and concerns on this topic with your Toronto City Councillor. You can find your City of Toronto Councillor by clicking on this link and entering your address.

For more information on this topic, you can visit, City of Toronto Property Tax review

In the 1980's and early 90's the Ontario as well as the federal governments in Canada were encouraging property owners to switch over to electric heating or dual-system heating including electric. Now, those with electric heating are being de-facto penalized by on the Ontario government for doing what the government wanted, by the new two-tier price scheme for Ontario electricity

If you live in an Ontario apartment building or condominium, whether you are a renter or unit-owner, I would appreciate knowing that your building has electric heating. Please e-mail me at I have electric heating so I can survey what multi-unit residential buildings have electric heating. (Sorry house owners, there are far too many of you to keep track of.)

If you are an Ontario tenant who did without any heat for part of last winter because you turned off your own heat for more than one day because you could not afford your electricity bills, and you are willing to be interviewed by the media about it to highlight the seriousness of this issue and help fight it, then please e-mail me here.

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