Reluctant landlords: Condo buyers find they are unable to evict tenants

For new Canadians, purchasing a first property is sometimes the fulfilment of the dream of a better life. But a group of buyers in a Cambridge, Ont., townhouse project are warning that an obscure section of Ontario tenant law can turn that dream into a nightmare.

“All the things went wrong. Nothing went right,” said Roland Shehaj, who bought a three-bedroom condo townhouse on Parkview Crescent in Cambridge Ont., in 2022. What he soon found out was that, because the townhouse was part of a complex that had been converted from purpose-built rentals to condominiums, he was not going to be able to move in so long as the tenants he inherited wanted to stay. “I have a cousin who’s sort of a paralegal. He said, ‘You’re screwed.’”