As a landlord, that is, as a person who, in a residential lease agreement, grants the tenant the right to live in a unit in exchange for the payment of rent, you may encounter difficulties in enforcing that payment. However, the law provides for different remedies, depending on the specific situation in which you find yourself, when the payment of rent is delayed. We help you with:Landlords’ law, Death of the tenant, Eviction, Non-payment of rent and frequent delays, Takeover of housing, Termination, subletting and assignment of lease
What the law provides
Under the Civil Code of Québec, the payment of rent is one of the tenant’s main obligations. The landlord can legally request the termination of the lease in the event of non-performance of an obligation by the tenant.
Normally, payment is due on the first of each month, unless the lease agreement provides for another date. If payment is not made on the due date, the tenant is considered late the next day.
It is important to note that under the law, you cannot provide in the lease agreement that if the tenant fails to make a payment, you are entitled to demand payment of the full rent. For example, if the contract is from July 1, 2024 to June 30, 2025, and the tenant defaults on rent due on September 1, 2024, you cannot require the tenant to immediately pay you rent from September 2024 to June 2025.
In addition, there are several situations where the tenant may validly not pay you the rent due and may remit the amount to the clerk’s office of the Administrative Housing Tribunal (TAL). This can be done if you are in default of performing your obligations as a landlord. However, the tenant must have obtained authorization from the TAL to do so and have sent you at least 10 days’ notice indicating the reason for filing with the registry.
The tenant can also deposit his rent with the TAL instead of rending it to you if, following the alienation of the building (for example, by a sale), he has not been personally notified of the identity of his new landlord and the TAL authorizes him to do so. The tenant may also do so, always with the consent of the TAL, when for any other serious reason he is not certain of the identity of the landlord, the landlord cannot be found or when the landlord refuses to pay the rent.
If the TAL allows it, the tenant continues to deposit his rent with the court office until the problematic situation is resolved.
Complaints Procedure
If you notice that the tenant is late in paying rent, you must first inform them. Subsequently, if the tenant does not remedy his default and you wish to bring an action before the TAL, you must send him a formal notice. This document serves to inform in a more formal way that you are blaming the tenant for non-payment of rent, in addition to warning them that you will take legal action if they do not comply within a specified period.
At any time, you can talk to the tenant to try to find common ground. There’s nothing stopping you from giving them extra time to make the payment.
If a formal notice has been received by the tenant and the situation has not changed, you can take one of the following actions, depending on your situation.
As soon as the tenant is late in paying the rent, you can go to the TAL to claim the amount owed, in addition to the interest and costs of the application.
Recourse to terminate the lease
There are 2 situations that legally allow you, as a landlord, to request the termination of the lease agreement when the tenant defaults on rent. Termination refers to the act of terminating the contract.
In both situations, if the tenant remedies his default before the judgment is rendered, he will be able to avoid the termination of the lease agreement.
The tenant often pays the rent late and the landlord suffers serious harm
Termination can be requested if the tenant often pays the rent late and you suffer serious harm as a result. Falling behind on your mortgage payments is such a harm. However, serious harm that is not financial is also accepted. Examples of non-monetary harms include:
- Abnormal burden on the management of the building, multiple steps taken with the tenant or the court to collect rents or additional costs;
- Worries and worries caused by the tenant’s stubbornness in withholding rent, time and energy spent on shifts before the Régie du logement, accounting notes and follow-up of the steps taken;
- Constant and multiplied steps to get paid, repeated requests to the Régie du logement to obtain payment of rent, management of three decisions of the Régie du logement;
- Numerous notices sent to the tenant to remind them of their delays, handing over the file to their lawyers to recover the rent owed and costs thus incurred;
- Increased efforts to obtain rent due and payment of bank charges for many returned cheques;
- Inability to dispose of amounts owed, collection procedures and loss of interest on money not received;
The TAL will not always order the termination of the lease. Indeed, the Civil Code allows him to give the tenant one last chance, if he deems it appropriate. Thus, if the latter does not change its behaviour within the period that the TAL determines, you can ask the TAL to terminate the lease agreement.
The tenant has not paid the rent for more than 3 weeks
The TAL will also terminate the lease agreement if the tenant has not paid the rent for more than 3 weeks. In this case, it is not possible for the TAL to decide to give the tenant one last chance.
If you have problems with non-payment or frequent late rent, please do not hesitate to contact us.