This is a question our family has been forced to look at this past year. This is also a huge warning to potential landlords.
We have had a home in Barrie and paid taxes to the city of Barrie for over 18 years now. Last year our family returned out west to work. We engaged a very large property management company in Barrie to lease our home. Its fees were called ‘Full service’ and its brochure advertised ‘Peace of Mind’.
This could not have been further from the truth.
The tenants placed in our home had bad credit, a very bad history of past evictions in Barrie and were known to the police. We then discovered the only reference that this company did have was a phone call to the tenants’ aunt.
When alerted, the company kindly gave us 30 days notice and left us on the other side of the country to deal with it. We then went through the legal process to have these people move off the property.
Of course, when we questioned as to ‘Why?’ people that have been evicted multiple times should be allowed to go through the system on a continual basis and hurt other families, we were told, ‘It was private and confidential.’
The day before eviction, County of Simcoe stepped in and paid the tenants’ bill in full.
In a nutshell, Ontario Works funded people, known to the police who do not pay one penny in rent, do not pay any utilities (which, we have been told will be added to our taxes) and do not even cut their grass.
We are now into August. The tenants continue to live for free and we are now faced with going through the whole legal process again.
We now have more than 8,000 in debts and legal fees. Who pays our bills?
Our family is close to financial ruin.
The government offices have offered no assistance whatsoever to our family.
The local MPs were not interested, the city is not interested.
The final irony; the insurance companies are now revoking policies to people who live out of province and have rental properties.
The government is crying there is not enough housing.
We will never rent again and we could lose our home because of it. If there is damage done to our property, who should be held responsible. The property management company? The County of Simcoe? What is wrong with the system?
There is a great deal wrong when funding goes to those, who year after year, live dishonestly and are rewarded for their deeds.
– Mary-Jane Fogel
Duncan, B.C.
http://www.thebarrieexaminer.com/2012/0 ... -the-lurch
