Frequently Asked Questions

Your first stop for self-help is a review of our FAQs. Take a look at the ever increasing collection of questions asked by Ontario’s small-scale landlords as well as the actual answers provided by Landlord’s Self-Help Centre.

The landlord must wait a 72-hour period following the eviction of the tenant before selling, retaining, or disposing of the property. The landlord must make the evicted tenant’s property available for retrieval at location close to the rental unit between the hours of 8 am and 8 pm. The landlord may face severe consequences for failure to allow tenant access to their belongings during the 72-hour period following the eviction.

When the landlord attends the Enforcement Office the landlord will be required to pay a $315.00 fee PLUS mileage costs for every kilometer the Sheriff has to travel from the courthouse to the eviction address. The specific mileage amount depends on where the rental property is located. The local Sheriff’s office should be contacted regarding their fees. If the landlord is unable to change the locks himself, they will have to use a locksmith and pay those fees as well.

A tenant can only be evicted by the Sheriff pursuant to an order from the Landlord and Tenant Board. It is the landlord’s responsibility, in the presence of the Sheriff’s Officer, to change the locks on the rental unit. If the landlord is unable to change the locks him or herself, a locksmith should be scheduled to attend while the Sheriff’s Officer is at the rental unit.

You can file with the Sheriff’s office for an eviction, usually the next day. The sheriff’s procedure can take approximately two to three weeks. You will have to arrange a locksmith to change the locks the day the Sheriff comes to evict the tenant, unless you are able to do this yourself.

It is not possible to evict only the husband. They are both names as joint tenants therefore both will have to be named on the N5.

The Landlord and Tenant Board will not normally evict a tenant for an illegal act unless the tenant has been charged while in the unit, and/or the act is serious enough that it has the potential to affect the character of the premises or to disturb the reasonable enjoyment of the landlord or other tenants. The Board’s Guideline #9 – EVICTION FOR AN ILLEGAL ACT OR BUSINESS https://tribunalsontario.ca/documents/ltb/Interpretation%20Guidelines/09%20-%20Eviction%20for%20an%20Illegal%20Act%20or%20Business.html provides some clarification as to the circumstances in which the Board will evict a tenant or occupant of the rental unit for an illegal act. With respect to collecting rent from these tenants, if they default on payment, you can serve them with an N4- Notice to End a Tenancy Early for Non-Payment of Rent.

The landlord must first obtain an order from the Landlord and Tenant Board directing that the tenancy is terminated. The landlord must take the order to the Superior Court of Justice Enforcement Office (Sheriff’s Office) to schedule an eviction. Present one certified order issued by the Landlord and Tenant Board and one copy of the order to the Enforcement Office together with a completed Eviction Information Request sheet (provided by the Enforcement Office). The landlord will receive instructions from the Enforcement Office that specify a vacate date. The Sheriff will send a Notice to Vacate to the tenant instructing the tenant to leave the rental unit on or before a specific date. The landlord MUST contact the Enforcement Office to schedule and eviction if the tenant fails to vacate by the date specified in the Sheriff’s notice to vacate. The landlord will be informed of the date and time the Sheriff will attend at the rental property to enforce the eviction order.

The police cannot help you in matters such as these since it’s a civil matter. In order to get this person out, there has to be grounds to terminate her tenancy. Based on what you have described, you would have grounds to evict based on non-payment of rent. In order to serve a proper notice, you will have to know the amount of rent she was supposed to be paying, when she stopped paying, and her full name. If you have all this information, you can serve her with a notice of non-payment of rent which is a Form N4. This is a 14 day notice which advises her to pay the arrears or move out. If she does neither, then the next step would be to file an application with the Landlord and Tenant Board to go to a hearing and obtain an order for termination. The forms required to apply are Form L1 along with a Certificate of Service. All these forms can be obtained from the Landlord and Tenant Board’s website at https://tribunalsontario.ca/ltb/forms/. If you’re willing to negotiate an agreement with her to vacate the premises, there is a mutual agreement form that both you and the tenant would have to sign; it’s called a Form N11- Agreement to Terminate a Tenancy. This form is also on the Board’s website under the Other Forms section of the site.

If you are successful in obtaining an order for termination and arrears, the order will require the tenant to pay the whole rent, and usually the application fee of $201 (in-person filing) and $186 (online through e-File) in order to avoid the eviction. If the tenants then fail to leave or pay and you have to file for enforcement of the order with the Sheriff, then the tenants would have to pay that fee as well in order to avoid eviction. If the tenants are  evicted and you want to try to re-coup rent arrears and the fees, you would do that later on through Small Claims Court. You cannot make mention of damages done to the unit at the hearing unless you claimed these amounts by filing an L2 application when you filed the L1 for rent arrears.  However, as of September 1, 2021, landlords can file an application for damages (including Sheriff’s fees) with the LTB within one year from the date the tenant was no longer in possession of the rental unit. The tenant must have moved out of the rental unit on or after September 1, 2021. However, you will need to know the tenant’s new residential address.

If you have all tenants under one lease, the tenancy ends only when all tenants give notice to terminate. There really isn’t a specific way to ensure that all the tenants leave at the end of the lease term. One suggestion is to ask them to provide you with the N9 notice 60 days prior to the lease expiring or have them all sign the N11- Agreement to Terminate a Tenancy form. If they all sign N9 or N11 and then one fails to move out, you would have to file an L3 Application with the Board to evict the remaining tenant(s). In the event that you cannot get all of them to sign the N9 or N11 and this one individual will not leave, legally there is nothing you can do to get him out at that point. However, since they were all under one lease they are all equally responsible for the rent, therefore if he stays and the rent is not paid in full you would then be able to give notice based on the non-payment of rent.

Only the Sheriff’s Department has the authority to evict a tenant. An eviction occurs when the tenant fails to vacate the premises after an Order has been issued by the Landlord and Tenant Board. The landlord must arrange for the eviction and pay the necessary fees. The Sheriff will return possession of the premises to the landlord. If the tenant refuses to leave the premises in the presence of the Sheriff’s officers, the local police will be called to provide assistance. The Sheriff’s Department does not remove belongings.

There is nothing in the Residential Tenancies Act that refers to charging the tenant storage fees during the 72 hour period the tenant is allowed to retrieve their belongings. However, after the 72 hour period passes, if the tenant has not made arrangements with the landlord to retrieve their belongings, the landlord can sell, keep or dispose of them. In cases where the landlord still has the belongings, the tenant can be required to pay storage fees, fees for arrears or damages before the landlord returns the belongings.

If your tenant is always paying the rent late, you should be serving him a notice of non-payment of rent (Form N4) each time the rent is not paid on the due date. You need to have documentation to prove the late payments, and the best way to do this is by serving notice Form N4. Once you have served several of these notices then you could serve him a termination notice based on persistent late payments which is a Form N8.

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