With a looming housing crisis and rental vacancy rates in some Canadian cities hovering near zero, finding a place to rent can be very challenging, especially if you own a pet.
But despite pushback from groups looking to stop landlords from banning pets, a new Angus Reid poll has found that overall, more than six in 10 Canadians think landlords should be able to refuse to rent their properties to pet owners.
The percentage is even higher among landlords, to 76 per cent, but splits evenly among renters.
“Even tenants or current renters themselves are split 50-50 on this issue, it is not as though renters are overwhelmingly on the side of compelling landlords to have to rent tenants with pets,” said executive director Shachi Kurl.
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The province that saw the biggest split was Saskatchewan, with 80 per cent of those surveyed agreeing that landlords should be able to refuse to rent their properties to pet owners.
“In every provincial jurisdiction except Ontario, landlords can prohibit tenants from adopting a pet after they have signed a lease on a unit,” reads the poll from Angus Reid.
The Canadian Animal Health Institute estimates there were more than 15 million pet cats and dogs in Canada in 2016.
The online survey was conducted last December among 5,413 Canadian adults and has a margin error of +/- two per cent.
- With files from Michelle Morton
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