The London Free Press: Tenant living ‘one day at a time’ as eviction deadline passes

Evicted from her apartment, Carol Rogers is glad to have found a new place to live, but fears other tenants who stayed past the eviction date in the building she used to live in could face homelessness.

Ken Thompson, one of as many of five tenants still in their units at 435 Nelson St., shares Rogers fears.

Rogers, Thompson and other tenants at the Nelson Street apartment building had a deadline of Sept. 30 to leave their apartments after receiving an N13 eviction notice in May from their landlord 435 Nelson Inc. The company intends to demolish the two-storey building with 23 units.

“I couldn’t deal with that anymore,” said Rogers, who has an incurable form of cancer. “I have to start thinking about my health and the stress was doing me in.”

Rogers, “fed up” with applications to rent units in other buildings being turned down, moved in with her sister in east London, vacating the Nelson Street unit she had rented for more than 10 years, she said.

Rogers stayed in the apartment until the deadline, still hoping to find an apartment.

“It was hell,” she said of the final week.

“Being there for that long…and knowing my life was taken out from under me, I had nowhere to go,” she said. “Thank God for my sister. It wasn’t good. I was so stressed and upset and crying and crying and crying.”

While other tenants have moved out, taking the offer of three months’ rent in compensation from Amanda Bouck of Elite Rental Management Inc. and 435 Nelson Inc., other residents chose to stay.

Thompson, who’s been a resident at the building for three years, said he’s living “one day at a time” since the deadline to vacate his unit.

“I’m not moving,” he said. “I’m staying right here. This is my home.”

Thompson, 62, with a heart condition the prevents him from working, goes to food banks twice a month and said his financial situation remains complicated. He would have to live in his truck if evicted from his apartment, he said.

However, losing his home is not the only thing that keeps Thompson awake at night.

He’s had safety concerns since part of the building’s front door was boarded up. Holes in his unit’s wall and ceiling have him worried about potential asbestos that could be affecting his partner’s health.

“She’s having a hard time sleeping and breathing,” Thompson said. “It’s really scaring me.”

The landlord left the holes in the walls and ceiling after putting in an electric heater that added $200 a month to Thompson’s utility bill.

Some relief came after his tub’s leak was fixed, but he hasn’t heard back from the company regarding fixing the rest.

In an interview with The London Free Press on Wednesday, Marty Gordon and Bouck, who own 435 Nelson Inc., , said the building will be demolished, but a date hasn’t been set because tenants are still at the building.

As for the unpatched holes, Gordon said they had started a renovation to change the heating system from a fossil fuel-powered heating system to an electrical energy-efficient one.

Tenants contacted the city’s building department when the electrician made the holes, saying 435 Nelson Inc. had been renovating without a permit, which led to a stop-work order on the building, he said.

As for the broken front door and other issues, Gordon said no other renovations are planned for the building because a demolition is inevitable.

“We halted the renovation, and we’re moving forward to demolish the building with plans to rebuild a larger building,” Gordon said, adding the new one will have approximately 200 units for working-class Londoners.

Bouck said tenants were not offered a unit at the new building that won’t be ready for at least seven years.

She said when the eviction notice was first served, residents were offered $10,000 to “peacefully” vacate the building, but refused.

For the London chapter of ACORN Canada, an organization that advocates for tenants, what’s happening to tenants at 435 Nelson St. is a case of “demovictions,” evictions for the purpose of demolishing a building to make more profit from a property.

However, Bouck said ACORN is “villainizing the landlords and the housing providers and the housing creators.”

“I’m not sure how they (ACORN) believe they’re helping these tenants, because they’re still going to be evicted at the end of the day. So, I’m not sure what false information they’re leading them to believe if they think they’re going to stop the demolition,” Bouck said.

ACORN spokesperson Robin Slade said tenants are not obligated to vacate their homes until the hearing before the Landlord Tenant Board is completed, which is scheduled for January.

Thompson said he hasn’t heard from the company since Sept. 29 regarding the status of the building’s demolition.

“We can’t afford another place because of the rent here” in the city, he said. “I don’t want to live in an RV. I’m too old for that, but I won’t sleep in a tent.”

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Article by Beatriz Baleeiro for The London Free Press