A six-figure compensation award to a B.C. tenant who was evicted for landlord’s use has been overturned in the province’s Supreme Court. An arbitrator from B.C.‘s Residential Tenancy Branch awarded Tariq Kassam $102,100 – representing 12 months' rent for the luxurious Vancouver condo from which he was evicted, plus a $100 filing fee – after concluding that Kassam’s landlord did not move into the property within a reasonable amount of time after evicting him. Kassam’s landlord – a numbered company owned by Dong Liu, his wife Yugao Zhang and his mother-in-law Yi He – petitioned the B.C. Supreme Court for a judicial review of the RTB arbitrator’s decision, arguing it was “patently unreasonable.” In a decision issued Friday and published online this week, B.C. Supreme Court Justice Karen F. Douglas agreed with the landlord’s position, quashing the compensation order and remitting the matter to the RTB for a new hearing. Eviction for landlord’s use Kassam moved into the condo on West Cordova Street in Vancouver’s Coal Harbour neighbourhood in November 2019, according to the decision. “Pursuant to the parties’ unsigned written tenancy agreement, Mr. Kassam agreed to pay monthly rent in the amount of $8,500,” the decision reads. “The petitioner denies Mr. Kassam ever paid rent in this amount.” Instead, the landlord told the court Kassam paid $8,400 a month until March 2020, just $6,300 a month from April to June 2020, $8,400 again from July 2020 to April 2021 and $8,000 a month after that. The eviction was not related to unpaid rent, and it appears from the court decision that the parties agreed that Kassam would pay the amounts the landlord claims he paid, rather than the $8,500 figure on the lease. For his monthly rent, Kassam resided in what BC Assessment lists as a two-bedroom, three-bathroom unit with more than 2,500 square feet of living space, located in a condo tower next to Harbour Green Park on the Coal Harbour waterfront. The unit’s 2025 assessed value is more than $4.4 million, according to BC Assessment. In February 2022, the landlord issued Kassam a two-month notice to end tenancy for landlord’s use of the property. The plan, according to the court decision, was for He and her husband Fuhan Zhang to move into the Coal Harbour unit while they built a new home on the British Properties parcel in West Vancouver where they had been residing. He and Zhang travelled to China in November 2021, initially planning to reside there for six months and move into the Coal Harbour condo in May 2022, the court decision indicates. Instead, the couple did not move into the condo until June 2023, roughly 17 months after they issued the eviction notice to Kassam. According to BC Assessment, He and Zhang’s property on Southborough Road in West Vancouver is home to a nine-bedroom, 14-bathroom mansion valued at more than $6 million. The assessor lists the building’s completion year as 2023. ‘Extenuating circumstances’ B.C.‘s Residential Tenancy Act allows landlords to evict tenants from their property if the landlord or a close family member intends to occupy the unit. A tenant can challenge an eviction for landlord’s use through the RTB if they believe the landlord is acting in bad faith, and the landlord or close family member must move into the unit within a “reasonable” amount of time after the eviction notice is issued. Landlords who leave their properties vacant or re-rent them to new tenants without following through on their plans to occupy the space themselves can be ordered to pay the evicted tenants compensation equivalent to 12 months' rent. In Kassam’s case, Douglas’s decision notes, there was no dispute that the landlords had a good faith intention to occupy the property. Kassam moved out without challenging the eviction notice. There was also no dispute that the landlords failed to move into the Coal Harbour condo within a reasonable time. The question before the RTB arbitrator, therefore, was whether there were “extenuating circumstances” that justified the landlord’s delay. The arbitrator concluded there was not, and awarded Kassam his six-figure compensation, basing the total on the $8,500-per-month rent listed in the lease document. The landlord petitioned the B.C. Supreme Court for judicial review, arguing that the arbitrator’s decision was “patently unreasonable” because it was based “entirely or predominantly on irrelevant factors;” it failed to consider relevant factors and apply the correct legal framework; it calculated Kassam’s compensation arbitrarily; and it provided “inadequate” reasons for the arbitrator’s conclusions. Douglas agreed with all of those arguments, finding that the arbitrator had “repeatedly referenced the wrong test in the RTB decision, considered irrelevant factors, and overlooked relevant factors.” Multiple errors by arbitrator The landlords argued that they did not move into the condo within a reasonable amount of time because Zhang’s health issues led them to stay in China longer than initially planned, then move in with their daughter – who provided extra care for him – when they returned to Canada. The judge’s decision does not reach a conclusion on whether Zhang’s health issues constituted extenuating circumstances that justified the landlords' failure to move into the condo reasonably quickly. Rather, it notes that the arbitrator failed to reach a conclusion on the matter. The arbitrator’s analysis, according to Douglas’s decision, primarily dealt with the health issues as a factor relating to the timing of demolition beginning on Zhang and He’s property in West Vancouver. Because the landlord’s stated intention was for Zhang and He to move into the condo when demolition began, the arbitrator concluded that they should have delayed issuing the eviction notice. Demolition did not begin until July 2022, and Zhang’s health issues had no impact on the timing of the demolition permit being issued, the arbitrator found, concluding that there was therefore an unreasonable delay between the notice and the move-in date even if things had gone according to plan. Douglas found this analysis irrelevant, noting that the landlord said Zhang and He intended to move in when they returned from China, initially planned for May 2022, a date that had nothing to do with the demolition plans. “Given the applicable statutory framework, the relevant question was not whether Mr. Zhang’s health issues delayed the issuance of demolition or building permits for the West Vancouver construction project, or whether Ms. He ought to have applied for the required permits earlier, but rather whether: 1) the landlord acted in good faith; and 2) Mr. Zhang’s health concerns and/or any other matters comprised extenuating circumstances which prevented the landlord from occupying the unit within a reasonable period of time,” the judge’s decision reads. “Based on my review of the RTB decision, the arbitrator did not engage in this analysis, but instead relied on factors that were not germane to the legal question before the RTB.” The arbitrator’s decision also repeatedly referenced “exceptional” circumstances, when the proper test in the Residential Tenancy Act should have been “extenuating” circumstances, according to Douglas’s decision. “It is unclear from the RTB decision what standard the arbitrator actually applied, or whether this affected the arbitrator’s analysis or ultimate conclusions,” the decision reads, noting that this lack of clarity contributed to concerns about the “adequacy” of the arbitrator’s reasons. On the question of the monetary award, the judge noted that both the landlord and the tenant agreed that Kassam was paying $8,400 in rent at the time of the eviction. Though there was disagreement between the parties about how much rent was paid at other times during the tenancy, Douglas noted that neither party ever claimed that Kassam paid the full $8,500 listed in the tenancy agreement. “The arbitrator failed to meaningfully address relevant and apparently cogent evidence on this material issue, thereby rendering the RTB decision arbitrary, irrational, and thus patently unreasonable,” the court decision reads. Douglas remitted the matter to the RTB for a new hearing and granted court costs to the landlord. If Kassam were successful at the new RTB hearing and received a monetary award equal to 12 months' rent at $8,400 a month, he would still stand to receive $100,800. Read more:
