A Bradford, Ontario woman said she was discriminated against by a potential landlord after coming to see a basement room with her same-sex partner.
Tatiana Dias and her partner have been looking for rental properties for the past few weeks in a very difficult market for tenants. According to Diaz, the two have seen several apartments with hospitable and hospitable landlords. Then her one-bedroom, one-bathroom basement suite in Bradford for $1,300 a month she found on her Facebook Marketplace.
“As soon as we walked in, I could see her face shocked that we appeared as women,” says Diaz. yahoo news canada.
Diaz says she told the person who posted the listing that she and her partner were coming to see the suite, even though she/her pronouns were used to refer to her partner. When the couple showed up, they were surprised by the landlord’s reaction.
Diaz recalls that the landlord seemed unhappy and hesitant when he went to see the place, which was only accessible through the garage door. When they step into the basement, the landlord decides to speak up.
“She showed up and said, ‘This is not going to work,'” Diaz recalls. “
“‘You need to get out,'” Diaz remembers the landlord saying.
The landlord followed them out of the house, and they left. Diaz tried to report the landlord’s post to her Facebook, but it was not removed because it was not clearly discriminatory.
Diaz followed up with her landlord to inform her that it was illegal not to rent to a person because of their sexual orientation, and was subsequently blocked by the landlord.
Diaz said he didn’t know yet if he would file a lawsuit, but wanted the issue to be recognized.
“Even if I don’t report it… people in Bradford know this is still happening and I’m just trying to raise awareness that we should be kinder to each other,” she said. say.
“Whatever your opinion, what’s wrong with renting to people who are quiet and paying rent? Why does it matter what they do behind closed doors?”
Diaz posted about her experience on Twitter, which has since garnered more than a million views, and recalled her landlord telling the couple “doesn’t support this lifestyle.”
Many of the comments shared similar experiences of discrimination.
“I thought Canada was a nice country.” One Twitter reply made me wonder. Another question asked, “Is this still happening? I wish I had been more shocked.”
Another joke: “I can tell you’re Canadian because you’re still saying ‘thank you’ to the person who harassed you.”
Whatever your opinion, what’s wrong with renting to people who are quiet and paying rent? Why does it matter what they do behind closed doors?
The lawsuit will be ‘tricky’
Edward Woods is a Hamilton-based paralegal who specializes in landlord and tenant boards. He said a landlord is not allowed to discriminate under Ontario’s human rights law, which includes religion, disability, creed, family status and sexual orientation. It could turn into a code battle, as he claimed that his philosophical beliefs were the reason he wouldn’t accept potential tenants.
“It gets tricky at that point,” he says. “But the discrimination that landlords are basing on is really frowned upon. Now that same-sex marriage is legal in this country, they are going to be in big trouble.”
Woods says Diaz and her partner can go to the Landlord-Tenant Commission or file a complaint in the Human Rights Court.
He says it wouldn’t set a good example for landlords if they directly discriminated against couples based on their sexual orientation and rented out suites to heterosexual couples. If you rent out the suite to a couple of
“It will give landlords more credit than tenants,” he says.
The Facebook Marketplace listing has since been removed, though it’s unclear if that’s because the apartment was rented out to someone else.
