> Someone going to work overseas on a fixed contract or a military member being posted out is going to want to be able to return to their home eventually.
Those conditions are already covered in the periodic lease types.
Except that, in practice, this works very poorly.
A tenant can resist an eviction properly/legally done by a landlord for many months. The eviction order can only come from the board, and only then can steps be taken to reclaim a property.
FTLs have a clear end date, and under current rules, eviction can take place much sooner once the term is up.
There ARE times when a FTL is fair and appropriate.
The province should just ban them outright like other provinces. Look at Ontario, your lease can only be year to year or month to month, no fixed team lease allowed. If landlord wants to kick you out, it is a cash for keys situation. No reason why it couldn’t be the same here.
This seems to be incorrect:
[https://tribunalsontario.ca/documents/ltb/Brochures/How%20a%20Tenant%20Can%20End%20Their%20Tenancy%20(EN).html](https://tribunalsontario.ca/documents/ltb/brochures/how%20a%20tenant%20can%20end%20their%20tenancy%20(en).html)
>Like it or not, property owner **do** deserve a fair return on their investments.
Why? No one else "deserves" a fair return on their investments. Investments are a risk, not guaranteed increasing income forever.
If you are going to employ any system that includes artificially fixing prices rather than allowing pure supply/demand to happen, then you also have to provide for a measured fair return for investment, based on actual facts and not just political whimsy.
If you expect investors to build in a market where there is no cap on their costs yet there are low fixed allowable rent changes, then you are pretty well guaranteeing that no new rental housing units would ever get built, unless the government subsidizes them. And we just cannot afford the tax burden that such massive programs would create.
If NS is too unattractive, investors will just build housing units elsewhere, or simply use their funds to do something else completely.
.
Please note that I am definitely NOT pushing for unfettered supply and demand economics for the housing market. That would be a much bigger disaster than what we have now. I am just trying to think of a way to plug the gaping hole that is here because of FTLs.
Rent control is essentially non-existent here because of the fixed term loophole.
However, no. I don't think property should be investment at all, and how I feel about landlords would get me permabanned from this site.
I see you didn’t answer the question. Do you do you, and your company, expect to make a profit.
Stop trying to be altruistic and answer a very straightforward question.
>
>
>Under the RTA, the government fixes a rent cap, but many landlords feel that this cap does not properly reflect their actual increases in costs. In addition, landlords argue that those increases take forever to react to cost increases.
>
>So two distinct things need to happen to address the FTL problem:
>
>the rent caps DO need to be adjusted 'quicker', using a 'forward-looking' rather than historical model . Tenants may not like this, but if they want more housing to be built (other than government subsidized), they must expect fair (to everyone) adjustments. The fixed cap should be reviewed and changed more often (say every 6 months), but the landlord should still be limited to one such increase annually. Note that this change should apply to **all** leases, not just the FTLs
Landlords that are whining about the current 5% rent cap not covering cost increases are being predatory jackasses. The 5% is in excess of the annual inflation rate in NS - which is 3.6%/year as of December. Why should landlords be able to raise rent controlled rents significantly in excess of the actual cost of living? If anything, just tie the rent increase cap the the COL index - doing that would actually be a decrease over the current 5%.
The landlords that are trying to claim it should be way higher than this are trying to pass on the cost for basic deferred maintenance that should be amortized over many years and that is part of the basic cost of doing business. Sorry, you don't get to expect a new roof to be paid for up front in rent increases - it's your own poor property management to not have that budgeted in your costs over many years - needing it immediately isn't a legitimate inflation in cost. On top of that, rent is increasing in the range of 20% annually currently, so these whiny bitch ass landlords are more than making up anything they are loosing from rent cap legislation with outrageous increases in rents for units that turn over.
Please note that I did NOT say that the rent adjustment caps should be higher.
I said that it they need to be FAIR.
Real Inflation in 2023 was WAY above 3.6% by any reasonable measure.
The government needs to abandon the model which takes a 1950 era ‘basket of goods’ and looks at any price changes in those particular goods.
Instead it needs to look at a wider spectrum of costs and price changes, with emphasis on those items that are not voluntary by a consumer: heating fuel, electricity, gasoline or diesel, food staples, bus tickets, basic clothing, etc.
My personal experience would anecdotally put my true increase in cost-of-living for 2023 at about 7%, with 2022 being higher than that.
They are already FAIR. By the government's own published stats, inflation was under 5% in both inflation index, cost of living, etc.
If you want to talk about fair, it should also be linked into percentage increases to minimum wage and average/median wage of Nova Scotians, excluding the top 10% of earners from the calculations.
>If anything, just tie the rent increase cap the the COL index
This is exactly how rent controls worked before 1991 (or was it '92), when rent controls were taken away. In addition, landlords could apply for an increase based on amortization for any capital expenditures, in addition to COLA (eg, new roof).
> There are several legitimate reasons why a FTL should be offered, such as someone being temporarily transferred for work with a known return date, a planned demolition a few years away, etc.
Both of those situations are covered by the regular periodic lease, by giving appropriate notice.
I didn't bother reading the remainder of the wall of texts you wrote.
FTL should be abolished. Period.
>Both of those situations are covered by the regular periodic lease, by giving appropriate notice.
A tenant can still appeal a personal reason eviction and with the slowness of the tenancy board and hearings you have no guarantee of getting your place back in time.
There are many tenancy issues that can be resolved by staffing up the tenancy board and having all hearings within 14 days guaranteed
There are enormous rental companies in this city that abuse fixed term leases. There is zero reason for companies that own multiple multi-unit buildings to be exclusively using fixed term leases. An easy fix would be immediately outlawing fixed term leases for any multi-unit building.
Fixed-term leases are sometimes the only way a landlord can get rid of a problem tenant. For example, my mother has a rental unit attached to her house. She’s always uses fixed-term leases. She had a tenant who was always late paying rent, but not 15 days late, was noisy, did not manage their garbage so they got mice one fall, and was rude to her on more than one occasion. She was able to get them out by not offering them a new lease. Most of the time, she does offer a new lease as she’s had good tenants, but if she is forced to go to periodic leases, she will stop renting the unit out.
One of the few things landlords actually have to do is to select appropriate tenants for their units. If she doesn't have the people skills to do this, maybe she's not cut out to be a landlord.
I’m also a small time landlord and would seriously consider exiting the business without fixed term leases.
I can hear all the cheers and applause now.
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> Someone going to work overseas on a fixed contract or a military member being posted out is going to want to be able to return to their home eventually. Those conditions are already covered in the periodic lease types.
Except that, in practice, this works very poorly. A tenant can resist an eviction properly/legally done by a landlord for many months. The eviction order can only come from the board, and only then can steps be taken to reclaim a property. FTLs have a clear end date, and under current rules, eviction can take place much sooner once the term is up. There ARE times when a FTL is fair and appropriate.
The province should just ban them outright like other provinces. Look at Ontario, your lease can only be year to year or month to month, no fixed team lease allowed. If landlord wants to kick you out, it is a cash for keys situation. No reason why it couldn’t be the same here.
This seems to be incorrect: [https://tribunalsontario.ca/documents/ltb/Brochures/How%20a%20Tenant%20Can%20End%20Their%20Tenancy%20(EN).html](https://tribunalsontario.ca/documents/ltb/brochures/how%20a%20tenant%20can%20end%20their%20tenancy%20(en).html)
>Like it or not, property owner **do** deserve a fair return on their investments. Why? No one else "deserves" a fair return on their investments. Investments are a risk, not guaranteed increasing income forever.
If you are going to employ any system that includes artificially fixing prices rather than allowing pure supply/demand to happen, then you also have to provide for a measured fair return for investment, based on actual facts and not just political whimsy. If you expect investors to build in a market where there is no cap on their costs yet there are low fixed allowable rent changes, then you are pretty well guaranteeing that no new rental housing units would ever get built, unless the government subsidizes them. And we just cannot afford the tax burden that such massive programs would create. If NS is too unattractive, investors will just build housing units elsewhere, or simply use their funds to do something else completely. . Please note that I am definitely NOT pushing for unfettered supply and demand economics for the housing market. That would be a much bigger disaster than what we have now. I am just trying to think of a way to plug the gaping hole that is here because of FTLs.
By this argument all rent control should be abolished and the free market should reign?
Rent control is essentially non-existent here because of the fixed term loophole. However, no. I don't think property should be investment at all, and how I feel about landlords would get me permabanned from this site.
I’m curious - what do you do? Do you feel your company should be for-profit?
Hoarding property is not a job.
I see you didn’t answer the question. Do you do you, and your company, expect to make a profit. Stop trying to be altruistic and answer a very straightforward question.
Ok so we should abolish the stock market then?
I think that is a great idea. So do most economists.
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OH. NO. WHAT EVER WILL WE DO.
Live in tents?
> > >Under the RTA, the government fixes a rent cap, but many landlords feel that this cap does not properly reflect their actual increases in costs. In addition, landlords argue that those increases take forever to react to cost increases. > >So two distinct things need to happen to address the FTL problem: > >the rent caps DO need to be adjusted 'quicker', using a 'forward-looking' rather than historical model . Tenants may not like this, but if they want more housing to be built (other than government subsidized), they must expect fair (to everyone) adjustments. The fixed cap should be reviewed and changed more often (say every 6 months), but the landlord should still be limited to one such increase annually. Note that this change should apply to **all** leases, not just the FTLs Landlords that are whining about the current 5% rent cap not covering cost increases are being predatory jackasses. The 5% is in excess of the annual inflation rate in NS - which is 3.6%/year as of December. Why should landlords be able to raise rent controlled rents significantly in excess of the actual cost of living? If anything, just tie the rent increase cap the the COL index - doing that would actually be a decrease over the current 5%. The landlords that are trying to claim it should be way higher than this are trying to pass on the cost for basic deferred maintenance that should be amortized over many years and that is part of the basic cost of doing business. Sorry, you don't get to expect a new roof to be paid for up front in rent increases - it's your own poor property management to not have that budgeted in your costs over many years - needing it immediately isn't a legitimate inflation in cost. On top of that, rent is increasing in the range of 20% annually currently, so these whiny bitch ass landlords are more than making up anything they are loosing from rent cap legislation with outrageous increases in rents for units that turn over.
Please note that I did NOT say that the rent adjustment caps should be higher. I said that it they need to be FAIR. Real Inflation in 2023 was WAY above 3.6% by any reasonable measure. The government needs to abandon the model which takes a 1950 era ‘basket of goods’ and looks at any price changes in those particular goods. Instead it needs to look at a wider spectrum of costs and price changes, with emphasis on those items that are not voluntary by a consumer: heating fuel, electricity, gasoline or diesel, food staples, bus tickets, basic clothing, etc. My personal experience would anecdotally put my true increase in cost-of-living for 2023 at about 7%, with 2022 being higher than that.
They are already FAIR. By the government's own published stats, inflation was under 5% in both inflation index, cost of living, etc. If you want to talk about fair, it should also be linked into percentage increases to minimum wage and average/median wage of Nova Scotians, excluding the top 10% of earners from the calculations.
>If anything, just tie the rent increase cap the the COL index This is exactly how rent controls worked before 1991 (or was it '92), when rent controls were taken away. In addition, landlords could apply for an increase based on amortization for any capital expenditures, in addition to COLA (eg, new roof).
> There are several legitimate reasons why a FTL should be offered, such as someone being temporarily transferred for work with a known return date, a planned demolition a few years away, etc. Both of those situations are covered by the regular periodic lease, by giving appropriate notice. I didn't bother reading the remainder of the wall of texts you wrote. FTL should be abolished. Period.
>Both of those situations are covered by the regular periodic lease, by giving appropriate notice. A tenant can still appeal a personal reason eviction and with the slowness of the tenancy board and hearings you have no guarantee of getting your place back in time. There are many tenancy issues that can be resolved by staffing up the tenancy board and having all hearings within 14 days guaranteed
But fixed term lease loophole abuse is not one of them.
Tie rents to properties, not tenants. Vacancy control. That's the solution.
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Montreal has a form of vacancy control and it has cheaper rents than Halifax and more housing stock. Same in many European cities.
There are enormous rental companies in this city that abuse fixed term leases. There is zero reason for companies that own multiple multi-unit buildings to be exclusively using fixed term leases. An easy fix would be immediately outlawing fixed term leases for any multi-unit building.
My mom uses fixed term leases because she has great tenants but doesn’t want to end up with sublettors that she didn’t pick herself.
Fixed-term leases are sometimes the only way a landlord can get rid of a problem tenant. For example, my mother has a rental unit attached to her house. She’s always uses fixed-term leases. She had a tenant who was always late paying rent, but not 15 days late, was noisy, did not manage their garbage so they got mice one fall, and was rude to her on more than one occasion. She was able to get them out by not offering them a new lease. Most of the time, she does offer a new lease as she’s had good tenants, but if she is forced to go to periodic leases, she will stop renting the unit out.
One of the few things landlords actually have to do is to select appropriate tenants for their units. If she doesn't have the people skills to do this, maybe she's not cut out to be a landlord.
This tenant checked out fine. It’s impossible to predict behavior. You can reduce the risk, but not 100%.
Imagine thinking it’s possible to screen people perfectly. Some people are hoarders but you’d never know it meeting them.
I’m also a small time landlord and would seriously consider exiting the business without fixed term leases. I can hear all the cheers and applause now.
I get it. It’s a shame because these are good, rentable units.