Tenants in Surrey, B.C., are devastated their landlord demanded a 40 per cent rent hike from them — with a warning if they don’t agree, they could lose their homes.
A tenants’ rights advocate says while the situation has some unusual aspects, landlords are free to make demands for higher rent, and many do.
Linda De Gonzalez, 70, has lived in Winsome Place Apartments since 2002. She lives on a $2,100-a-month pension and pays $1,014 a month for her two-bedroom unit, well below the CMHC’s median rent for such a unit in Surrey — a city east of Vancouver — at $1,446.
But in late April, De
