Lived experiences of eviction in Canada

We commissioned a research team from the School of Urban Planning at McGill University to conduct this literature review. Its focus is on the lived experiences of people who were evicted in Canada in recent years.

The research questions aimed to uncover:

• who was being evicted and why
• how tenants responded when faced with an eviction
• the effects of eviction on tenants

Almost all participants indicated they had been evicted due to landlord factors, with own-use repossessions being the most common reason. The project highlighted a new type of eviction — retaliatory eviction — initiated as a response to specific tenant actions. Racialized and Indigenous participants experienced retaliatory eviction more frequently.

This literature review also proposes:

• a new way of understanding the drivers of eviction
• looking at system-level factors like rental market conditions
• tenant protections

Author:

CMHC

Document Type:

PDF

Date Published:

April 19, 2023