A South Asian family is being forced to find a new apartment because their sick daughter had been crying at night, that lead to complaints from a downstairs tenant.
Mukesh Khanal, father received an email from his landlord on May 14 about “ongoing issues with regards to noise at night.”
Writing back he explained back that his daughter had been very sick and had been up at night crying. Less than an hour later, he was informed via email their lease would not be renewed.
Amy Stewart with Savard Properties wrote, “Your child has been ill and is keeping the basement tenant awake at night and it has gone on for several nights…. At this point, as this has been an ongoing issue, we will not be renewing your lease at the end of June 2018. Obviously you and your family would do much better in a whole house as opposed to shared accommodations.”
And the very next day, a notice was taped to their front door saying they would have to be out by noon on June 30.
Khanal noted there was one other noise complaint that he received from the landlord last December.
In a separate email response to Khanal, who stated he was being kicked out, Stewart wrote:
“We are not ‘kicking you out’ at all, we are not renewing your lease. This is absolutely an ongoing issue. I have all the correspondence. This is obviously not a good fit and it would be better for you to live in a peaceful place.”
Stewart added:
“As you stated in your email, you are exhausted because you haven’t been sleeping, just like the basement tenant has said. You have explained the situation very clearly.”
Khanal with his wife, and daughter, Prakriya, moved in July 1, 2017. The downstairs tenant moved in a few months later. Prakriya is now two years old.
Khanal is looking at filing a formal complaint with the Alberta Human Rights Commission.
Khanal agrees the landlord has every right not to renew their lease — but he says that doesn’t make it right.
He said, “It’s not the hassle, I’ve moved before. I’ve been in Calgary over three years, moving is not the hassle. It’s scary to think that there are so many people in Calgary with kids, scary to think the landlord can just ask you to move out.”
