B.C. government expands 55+ strata bylaw exemptions

The B.C. government is making changes to the rules surrounding strata with age restrictions, with the aim of preventing expectant families from getting evicted due to regulations.

On Monday, the province announced changes to the Strata Property Regulation, adding more exemptions to 55+ bylaws. That includes situations where residents have children, need to take care of a dependent, or have a spouse or partner move in.

The new exemptions take effect immediately.

Last fall, the B.C. government amended the Strata Property Act to end rental restriction bylaws and limit age restriction bylaws to allow for more housing options for seniors.

That led to situations like Razan Talebian’s, an expectant mother who was told she could be kicked out of her Maple Ridge strata when she gave birth, as the building was moving to become 55+, CityNews first reported in February.

“I’m very grateful they took us seriously because it kind of felt it was against us,” Talebian told CityNews in an interview on Monday.

“It’s good to know that I can have more children here.”

Related Stories:

• Pregnant Maple Ridge woman says strata’s 55+ change is forcing her out

• B.C. rental restriction legislation to be amended, premier says

Talebian says she and her family plan on staying at the unit they recently purchased, pointing out that its value has dropped so moving would not be feasible.

“I should have never felt like I had to leave because I’m having a child,” she explained.

“Now that I feel like I can be at my home it’s like ‘yeah, I have my basic rights.’ I purchased this legally and now I’m allowed to have my baby here legally.”

She adds she’s grateful her story got so much attention, noting that others in her situation haven’t had the same success.

“I feel like I got really lucky that this got picked up enough to get the attention of the government because I feel like this has been trying to get changed for a really long time. So I’m just really glad that a lot of people saw the story and took it, because I don’t know if anything would have changed,” she said. 

B.C. Housing Minister Ravi Kahlon says strata rules shouldn’t prevent people from looking to start a family.

“After hearing from a few people experiencing similar situations, we’ve made changes so they and others can grow their families or support their children, while knowing that they’ll be able to stay in the home they know and love,” he said in a statement.

Kahlon says the amendment will affect about 230 out of 34,000 strata buildings in the province.

“I think that many that did choose to go that direction have realized that now it perhaps had a lot of unintended consequences,” he told reporters Monday.

“We know that they have the right to choose to go to 55+ … in the end, our policy decision was about getting more people available rentals in the market and the policy has succeeded.”

He continued, “We’re in a housing crisis and in the end, we want to make sure that much housing stock that we have is available to the public.”