Does Ontario Law Allow Eviction of a Tenant During Winter Months?
A Tenant Can Be Lawfully Evicted at Any Time of Year But the Landlord Tenant Board May Use Discretion and Choose to Postpone the Eviction Because of Hardship Concerns Rather Than Because of Any Actual Mandate to Refrain From Evicting During the Winter.
The belief that a residential tenant cannot be evicted during the winter is false. There is nothing within the Residential Tenancies Act, 2006, S.O. 2006, Chapter 17 (the "RTA"), being the law that governs residential tenancies, that prevents a wintertime eviction; however, the RTA does contain section 83 which provides an adjudicator at a hearing of the Landlord Tenant Board to make discretionary decisions that may involve delaying an eviction and the reasoning for doing so may be because it is winter. Accordingly, the adjudicator may choose to refrain from issuing an Order to Evict during the winter months or may choose to issue an Order to Evict with a delayed eviction date. It seems that whereas an adjudicator may refrain from issuing an Order to Evict because it is wintertime, the urban myth was born that a tenant cannot be evicted during the wintertime. Of course, this is a false truth, meaning a perception based on misunderstanding. The misunderstanding arises when people misinterpret the reason that an adjudicator may refrain from issuing an Order to Evict in the wintertime whereas such a decision is a choice based on a discretion. The adjudicator may choose such a discretion out of concern for the hardship that a wintertime eviction would cause rather than because of any mandate in law.
Theresa Forrest, Paralegal provides Landlord Tenant Board services for clients located in London, Brantford, Woodstock, Niagara Falls, Grimsby, among other places.
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