Canada/Rental housing: Halifax switches to "proactive" inspections

The Halifax Regional Municipality says it wants to take a "proactive" approach to enforcing rental property standards, whereas previously it only intervened on receipt of a complaint.

Since last May, a register of rental properties has been available to the public on the Municipality's open data site. The latest update, on December 14, lists what municipal staff consider to be the bulk of the housing stock in Nova Scotia's capital city.

According to the latest data, 11,837 addresses are listed, totaling 63,046 dwellings. These properties include small and large buildings, condominiums, mobile homes and more than 4,500 addresses designated as complete homes.

In a report published in October, city staff estimated that around 1,152 of these units were short-term rentals.

Avoiding landlord reprisals

In the same document, the Municipality also identified at least 4608 unlisted rental properties, many of which were the subject of building standards complaints. Staff plan to prioritize these homes for preventive inspections. One of the aims of this measure is to reduce landlord retaliation against tenants.

It's a challenge we're facing," says Heather Clark, a tenants' rights advocate. According to her, many tenants are afraid to report problems to the municipality's 311 service for fear that their landlord will refuse, for example, to renew a fixed-term lease.

The president of ACORN for mainland Nova Scotia is delighted with the creation of a rental property registry in Halifax, a measure she has been campaigning for. People can see exactly where these units are on the map and who's not listed," she says.

Heather Clark believes, however, that the register should be fine-tuned to identify more clearly the properties for which offences have been reported, and the nature of those offences.

A useless register, according to a group of owners

In an e-mail, Kevin Russell, Executive Director of the Nova Scotia Association of Real Estate Investment Owners, called the registry useless, describing it as a simple interactive map with basic information.

He believes city council should put an end to the red tape imposed on property owners, as well as the tax hikes that drive up housing costs.

Source: ici.radio-canada.ca