B.C.’s Residential Tenancy Branch only gave partial compensation to a Burnaby tenant who suffered damage and massive inconvenience from a flood that was not their fault.
The flood was caused by a burst City of Burnaby water main, forcing the tenant to immediately move out into temporary accommodations and damaging some of their furniture and personal items. The tenant also had to rent a storage unit because the temporary accommodation was smaller than the place they were renting at the time of the flood.
The tenant was looking for a refund on rent, a return of the security deposit and coverage of the storage unit.
The tenant wrote the landlord expecting to eventually move back into the rental unit. The tenant also blamed the landlord for the flood, saying that it was partly the result of a storm drain closed with debris from trees on the rental property that should have been cleared by the owner.
Three months after the flood, the tenant contacted the landlord to find out when the repairs to the rental unit would be completed so they could move back in.
“They did not receive a reply,” says the RTB ruling document. “At the beginning of October, no restoration work had been done; the only work that had been performed was the removal of contaminated flooring and drywall.”
The tenant was fed up so they told the landlord that they would be seeking other permanent housing because “four months had passed since the flood and the renovations had not progressed. The tenants considered the contract to be frustrated” and demanded a return of the security deposit and a pro-rated return of the rent for one of the months.
But the landlord never responded and so the tenant took the case to the RTB, said the ruling document.
In the RTB ruling, the adjudicator said they did not agree that the landlord was negligent in “failing to keep a storm drain clear of debris.”
But the ruling did agree that the landlord had not properly communicated and agreed the tenant was allowed to terminate the rental agreement.
The ruling awarded the tenant nearly $1,500 but denied the tenant to be reimbursed for the storage unit costs since the flood was not the fault of the landlord.
