Friday, June 09, 2006

rentalsman rules in favour of brian keith solberg

i was listening to the radio on wednesday and heard about housing dilemma brian keith solberg was facing. for those that don't know, brian keith solberg is a convicted child molester who after being released settled into a condo in regina. the police issued public safety alerts with his picture, and his offending behavior. mr. solbergs land lord wanted to evict mr. solberg after receiving several complaints from concerned neighbours. the land lord then gave mr. solberg the proper eviction notice but mr. solberg challenged the eviction with the rentalsman. the rentalsman ruled in mr. solbergs favour and said he could not be evicted unless the land lords reasons for eviction were more paramount than mr. solbergs reasons for wanting to stay.
this story bothers me not only because we are putting the comforts of a child molester with a high risk to reoffend above the concerns of law abiding citizens, but because the owner of the home said child molester is renting doesn't have the right to say who lives in his home. people who own homes and rent them to others should have the right to dictate who resides on their property for whatever reason they see fit as long as they give proper notice. as a home owner that rents my home to others, i want to know that i can kick someone out because they smell, or they have acquired a drug problem, or the don't drink the same beer or smoke the same cigarettes as me. i would never do these things because i am farely picky about who lives in my house in the first place. but if i did rent my house to someone and found out later that they were once a child molester, or murderer i know that this would make my neighbours uncomfortable and i would want to kick him or her out of my house(with the proper notification of course).
i once enforced kicking someone out of a rental property my parents owned. the tenant had neglected to pay rent for about two months, my dad confronted him and said he understood if he could not pay the entire amount at once, but would like to at least see an effort and would like part of the rent by monday(this conversation took place on friday)or he would be kicked out. he never had any money on monday so i bought some pad locks and locked him out of the house. i drove by a while later and saw he had broken into the house to remove his belongings. needless to say i didn't give the appropriate notice and was informed of that by the RCMP. in the end we took this former tenant of ours to court, he lied in court saying we charged a damage deposit when we didn't. in the end we were informed we didn't give him proper notice but he still owed us the rent he neglected to pay us and our legal fees, we were told we could garnish his wages and seize his truck to sell and collect the money owed to us(as long as we did it legally). my dad was one of the most laid back land lords i have ever met and this guy tried to take advantage of that. he broke every rule we had layed out including no roomates without rent going up, and no smoking inside. the previous guy living in that house was always late on rent but he at least made the effort and paid what he could even if it was only $20, and after he moved out he still made the effort to pay my dad without having to be hassled. land owners who rent their property to others need more rights instead of dead beats and child molesters dictating the rules. in the case of my parents rental property everything did work out in our favour(don't mess with legal machine at my dads disposal, just kidding)although we still haven't seen the money owed to us for rent and legal fees. from time to time i hear a rumour about where the guy renting our house is living or what he is doing but i don't think it is worth the effort to try to get blood from that stone.

3 Comments:

Anonymous Ian H. said...

If you don't like a tenant, just jack up the rental fee until they leave. I know that leaves them in there for another three months, but it's legal.

09 June, 2006 18:15  
Blogger Ross said...

never thought of that

10 June, 2006 03:45  
Blogger poorfarmer said...

I don't always get mad, but I sure do get even. If our tenant ever reads this, remember this You owe Me.

11 June, 2006 05:05  

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