'How disgusting': Whistler, B.C., Craigslist ad offers free rent for 'girl-friend with benefits'

Free housing offered in ‘disgusting’ ad As B.C. grapples with a housing crisis, some bad players are trying to take advantage of people’s desperation.

A recent Craigslist ad offering free housing in a B.C. resort community comes with a concerning caveat.

The advertisement asks for a potential tenant to act as a “girl-friend with benefits” in exchange for staying in a one-bedroom studio in Whistler at no cost.

“Looking for a nice girl who wants to be in a fun, occasional relationship,” the poster writes.

The person who wrote the listing identifies himself as a “local business man” in his early 30s who has a house in Whistler’s Nordic neighbourhood and describes himself as “handsome and fit.”

The man adds he’s currently in an “ethically non-monogamous relationship.”

Advertisements like this one have been spotted across B.C.’s hot housing market for years, including in 2016 when CTV News conducted a hidden camera interview with a landlord who asked for sexual favours in lieu of rent.

Premier David Eby—when asked about the Whistler man’s offer at an unrelated news conference Monday—called the post “disgusting.”

“The conduct of this individual is very disturbing to me,” he said. “The urgency around the housing crisis for British Columbians is that those who are most vulnerable are put in a really untenable situation.”

Eby added that his government is addressing the housing crisis by taking steps that are “not universally popular,” such as the recently announced short-term rental restrictions and housing targets for municipalities.

Whistler specifically is exempt from the incoming rule that requires a short-term rental to be the operator’s principal residence, and it was not on the list of cities that were given a number of units to build over the next five years. The resort municipality is also exempt from the foreign buyers ban and the empty homes tax.

“This is urgent and it puts people in very vulnerable situations with predatory behaviour like this,” he said.

CTV News has reached out to the man behind the Craigslist post and will update this story if a response is received.