‘It’s not all about the bottom line, all of the time’: As many in Ontario struggle to make rent under COVID-19, one landlord is actually offering its tenants relief

Last fall, like many tenants across Ontario, Kayla Lemieux was struggling to make rent.

Money had been tight for a few years — since her daughter was diagnosed with cancer and she’d gone on social assistance. She’d hoped to return to work as a personal support worker shortly before COVID-19 hit, but the threat of bringing the virus home brought those plans to a halt.

By fall, Lemieux’s finances jeopardized her roughly $940 rent payments.

“Things were just going wrong for me, and I’d been trying to fill out budgets and get a payment plan going,” she said.

That’s when she was told of a program her landlord offers for renters in a pinch. Soon after she applied, her phone rang: her arrears had been wiped clean, and she wouldn’t be charged for any rent the following month. “I actually cried on the phone.”