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Mobile Home Parks

White et al. v. Upper Thames River Conservation Authority 154 O.R. (3d) 133 | 2020 ONSC 7822

The applicants were the owners of permanent, non-mobile rental units located on a residential complex covered by a 20-year lease with the respondent. Each tenant under the lease was permitted occupancy from March 1 to November 30, with occupancy in January, February and December restricted to specified hours on weekends only. When the lease was extended for a further ten years, each tenant was granted an option to change the non-occupancy period to the months of January, February and March. The respondent was inconsistent in enforcing the terms of the lease with regard to occupancy. The applicants applied to the Landlord and Tenant Board for an order that the Residential Tenancies Act prevented the respondent from restricting access to the rental units. The Board concluded that the tenants should have unrestricted access to their rental units because the alternative would amount to a substantial interference with their reasonable enjoyment. The Board also determined that no remedy was necessary as the respondent had taken essentially no action to prohibit access. The respondent appealed.

Held, the appeal should be allowed.

The Board erred in determining that the Act prohibited the parties to the lease from mutually agreeing to include a provision limiting the tenants' right to occupy the rental units during agreed-upon periods of time. The Board relied on s. 22 of the Act, which prevented a landlord from substantially interfering with a tenant's [page134] reasonable enjoyment of a rental unit. A reading of the ordinary sense of s. 22 did not lead to a determination that the respondent substantially interfered with the reasonable enjoyment of the units when the tenants voluntarily agreed to the provision in the lease. To find that any limitation to access to a rental unit during certain time periods equated to substantial interference with reasonable enjoyment would be to unnecessarily limit the ability of landlords and tenants to enter into flexible arrangements regarding leased premises. It was unnecessary to send the matter back to the Board for redetermination as the result was inevitable. The Board's order regarding the tenants' right to access the premises was set aside.