Tenants are experiencing an “urgent and untenable” situation in New Brunswick

A study paints a grim portrait of the reality of renters in New Brunswick. More than a quarter of households have rent that is too expensive for their income and housing costing less than $1,000 per month is becoming increasingly rare.

The research report entitled Sans protection : an examination of the rental housing crisis in New Brunswick was produced by the New Brunswick Tenants’ Rights Coalition, in collaboration with the University St. Thomasthe University of New Brunswick, the Community Housing Transformation Center and the New Brunswick Innovation Foundation.

This study analyzes the rental housing situation in the province between 2020 and 2023. It is based on data and analysis of current policies, but also on comments collected from 350 tenants from different demographic groups and different regions. .

Housing under $1,000 is a rare commodity

The province has more than 88,000 renter households, according to 2021 census data from Statistics Canada.

Among them, more than 27% live in unaffordable housing, meaning they spend more than 30% of their income on rent.

According to Matthew Hayesco-author of this study, these people do enormous sacrifices to keep your head above water.

“Am I able to eat? Or am I able to pay for electricity? Or do I have to make cuts to pay the rent?”he said, speaking of the choices this category of tenants must make.

The availability of affordable housing has declined significantly in recent years.

In 2016, 34,075 housing units offered rent for less than $750 per month. In 2021, this number increased to 25,450, a decrease of more than 25%, which represents 8,600 housing units.

In comparison, the number of housing units offering rent between $1,000 and $1,499 increased by nearly 9,200 units during this period.

For people on low incomes, where are their options?lance Matthew Hayes.

Faced with this accessibility crisis, tenants often feel stuck and have no choice but to pay the increase in their rent, in the absence of other essential needs.

If a landlord increases their rent, they think, “it’s not really affordable to stay here”, but looking elsewhere is no longer feasible for them.

They are essentially impoverished by the housing system.

In summary, the study shows that tenants have difficulty finding affordable housing in good condition, are afraid of rent increases and eviction notices and must take difficult decisions.

A rent control regime requested

The report lists around ten solutions to this housing crisis. Among them, it is proposed to adopt a rent control regime whose increase limit would not exceed the consumer price index.

This rent increase limit linked to inflation would be revised annually and would therefore make it possible to cover the costs exorbitant for owners, but also to stabilize rent increases for tenants, explains Matthew Hayes.

The report also proposes modernizing the Residential Rental Act and to establish a Property and Tenancy Tribunal which would better apply this law, to resolve disputes between landlords and tenants.

According to Matthew Hayesthe current court does not take into consideration the right to housing and simply acts as a mediator. It is difficult for tenants to present evidence or respond to a landlord’s allegations, so this court only widens the inequalities between the two parties, he adds.

The Coalition for Tenants’ Rights hopes that the next government will take into account this study which demonstrates a situation urgent and untenable tenants.