Help Halifax tenant fight renoviction

My name is Stacey Gomez. I have lived in a small building in a historic part of Halifax, NS for almost 5 years. I love my home and now find myself fighting to remain – as the new landlord Marcus Ranjbar (aka. HalifaxHouseFlips) tries to have me renovicted.

Ranjbar purchased the building in December 2021 and immediately tried to get rid of all the tenants. He then started renoviction proceedings against those of us who resisted. Now, I am one of the last remaining tenants in the building. Check out this CBC article for more info.

Ranjbar has used almost every tactic in the book to try to get me to leave, including refusing to make essential repairs, taking away a private garbage service (which constitutes a rent increase) and defamatory social media posts about me. As my hearing at the Residential Tenancy Board approaches on August 31st, 2022, he has taken a number of actions, including demolishing the front steps to the building with no notice (impeding my mail delivery), demolishing my patio and destroying my garden with no notice, blocking the main entrance to my home and generally creating an unsafe environment. In October, the landlord was issued an Order to Vacate Unsafe Property due to high levels of mould detected in an air quality test. This is the result of over 1 year of inaction to address this issue on the part of the landlord. While the Order is temporary, he has locked me out of my home, claiming wrongly that my tenancy is over effective immediately.

The housing situation in Halifax is dire, with a rental vacancy rate of 1%, one of the lowest in the country. Landlords shouldn’t be permitted to displace people through renovictions, simply to maximize their profits. I firmly believe that this is a critical case in the struggle against renovictions in Nova Scotia. For this reason, I am seeking community support. I will use the funds raised for legal costs and other fees relating to my case.