Toronto Renters Forum

Landlords => Landlords => Akelius => Topic started by: CNDraycott on November 24, 2023, 10:56:41 am

Title: If you are SICK of Akelius and are ready to stand up against them, join us!
Post by: CNDraycott on November 24, 2023, 10:56:41 am

ATTENTION ALL AKELIUS TENANTS IN TORONTO!!!

WE NEED YOUR HELP!

I posted on this forum some time ago, asking tenants to speak up about the AGIs that Akelius was subjecting against their renters. Since then, a lot has happened, but a lot has also stayed the same. At 77 Spencer Avenue in Toronto, we refused to pay the above guideline increase of 4.5%, opting instead to pay for the 2.5% as mandated by the province. After numerous staged sit-ins at Akelius, no one has answered to our outrage, nor have they agreed our request to remove the petition for the AGI. Akelius has now (for the second year in a row) subjected the tenants of our building, as well as to many other Akelius owned properties to yet ANOTHER AGI for 2024

Tenants can NOT take any more financial strain, and Parkdale Legal has suggested that if we can organize between other Akelius owned buildings in Toronto, that staging a large scale sit-in as well as launching actions for a rent-strike may be enough to warrant their attention.

Sitting behind our computers and complaining about our rent rates is not going to change anything in the real world for either ourselves OR our neighbours. There are some people who live in Akelius buildings who are elderly, living on government aid due to disability, or having their housing subsidized by charitable organizations. At the end of the day, Akelius doesn't feel the strain from a struggling economy, they BENEFIT from it while the people and organizations meant to support the people are the ones paying for it. Their continued, unabashed greed is taking away from the resources we could be providing to our community, and significantly decreasing the comfort and enjoyment our our homes. Meaningless cosmetic changes, poorly managed maintenance, and the utter disrespect of our neighbours needs to end.

WE WANT TO HEAR FROM YOU. WE WANT TO ORGANIZE WITH YOU!!

If you're interested to learn more, or are even just looking for support in building a tenant's association in your Akelius building, please connect with us on Facebook:

https://www.facebook.com/groups/1481005342631661/?mibextid=oMANbw (https://www.facebook.com/groups/1481005342631661/?mibextid=oMANbw)

If you want to see just what we've been up to in our fight against Akelius, check out this article about our building on the CBC:

https://www.cbc.ca/news/canada/toronto/parkdale-tenants-protest-1.6859475 (https://www.cbc.ca/news/canada/toronto/parkdale-tenants-protest-1.6859475)

Title: Re: If you are SICK of Akelius and are ready to stand up against them, join us!
Post by: Head Administrator on November 24, 2023, 09:43:03 pm

We the Admins of the Toronto Renter's Forum just wanted make a couple of supportive comments regarding this post, and in particular these words:

Quote

Sitting behind our computers and complaining about our rent rates is not going to change anything in the real world for either ourselves OR our neighbours.

We receive lots of questions from renters, and we hear lots of horror stories, and these things are part of the reason that we created this Forum.  And while we believe that this Forum is a (small) part of the solution (we endeavour to be a safe place for renters to compare notes, learn from one another's experiences, and maybe even organise themselves into a renter’s union or something, etc.), we also know that this Forum has a negative effect upon renters’ activism too.  What we’re talking about is the fact that many renters use this Forum to vent their frustrations upon our sympathetic ears, and then they feel better, and then they leave without taking action to actually improve their own situation.

We unfortunately live in an era of social-media induced inaction.  Occupying your landlord’s office for a couple of hours does far more to further your cause than spending those hours making hundreds of angry posts online, because online noise doesn’t have the same impact when the actions that you are complaining about are unfair, rather than illegal.

No politician is going to see your hundreds of posts and send in city inspectors or the police, because by and large the abusive things that your landlord is doing to you are LEGAL.

Take, for example, Above Guideline Rent Increases - they are profoundly unfair (no other business gets to temporarily modify the legal contract you have with them in order to push their maintenance and upkeep costs onto you the customer, no indeed!, regular businesses have to depreciate the value of their equipment and set aside funds to repair and replace things as necessary).  But the fact is that Above Guideline Rent Increases are legal, codified in the Residential Tenancies Act.

Wise homeowners save money in a Rainy Day Fund, and there are laws requiring condo boards to maintain appropriately sized Reserve Funds held in trust to cover large expensive capital projects.  The problem of how to pay for large repairs isn’t a difficult one to solve.  Yet somehow the landlords have used their money and influence to lobby the government to create laws to their advantage.  This is what must change.  And it won’t change because people make a few angry posts online.  Real change to remove unfair laws requires real action in the real world.  And that is why we like CNDraycott’s post, because it is the correct first step towards making these changes.

Title: Re: If you are SICK of Akelius and are ready to stand up against them, join us!
Post by: 2ndClassCitizenCane on January 01, 2024, 01:03:05 pm

The REIT companies have banded together and by doing so are stronger than tenants voices.
To overcome this

ALL TENANTS IN ONTARIO SHOULD BE A SINGLE UNION.

Tenants need to rewrite the rule book.
There needs to be a STANDARD OF LIVING across the province, not a bunch of regulations that aren't enforced.
TAX THE REIT COMPANIES.
If landlords do not comply to standards they are FINED IMMEDIATELY, no courts or tribunals.
Go after the money is how you hurt a corporation.