This is one out of a series of reports related to residential tenancy issues in Alberta. This report addresses issues eight and nine identified in ALRI’s Residential Tenancies Act: General Issues paper.

Distress for rent is an ancient common law self-help remedy that, under certain conditions, allows a landlord to seize and sell a tenant’s property to recover unpaid rent. While there are many aspects of the English common law that still inform the law in Alberta, what makes distress for rent unusual is that it remains substantively unchanged since its reception in 1870.

This report recommends that distress for rent should be abolished for residential tenancies in Alberta. This report, and its recommendations, are limited to distress for rent in residential tenancies. It does not apply to distress for rent in non-residential tenancies such as commercial or mobile home site tenancies, or other forms of distress.