Devon McKenzie fought “tooth and nail” to stay in her affordable east-end apartment but after a seven-month battle with a landlord who owns just one per cent of the house, the process, she said, has worn her down. “I’m done. I’m moving out of Toronto. I am going to pick up and start something new,” said McKenzie, 24, who, after fighting multiple attempts to evict her through the Landlord and Tenant Board and facing a separate eviction over rent she said was owed by previous roommates, has agreed to leave by the end of May.“I’ve been fighting this on my own. I want to get on with my life.”McKenzie had been trying to block repeated attempts by her landlord to force her out for his own personal use, which she fought because Jacky Bai Jun Liu, a first-time homebuyer in his early 20s, had acquired the landlord title after he was sold just a one per cent stake in the house in midsummer. McKenzie told the Star that Liu had told her during a phone call he was a Ryerson student and intended to move his friends into the house.Almost immediately after the sale, Liu moved to evict seven tenants from two units, in June serving them with an N12 notice co-signed by one of the primary homeowners, informing them that Liu intended to exercise his legal right to take over the property for personal use. The upstairs renters left, telling the Star they had already considered finding a new place to rent. McKenzie, who shared the downstairs apartment with three others, stayed put to fight on principle, she said, and because a lack of affordable rental housing meant she had nowhere to go.In September, McKenzie went to the board with a lawyer ready to fight but a paralegal representing Liu declared that a failure to properly fill out paperwork on their side meant the application was invalid and should be withdrawn. The adjudicator agreed. Minutes after McKenzie stepped into the hallway an employee of Beaunest Property Services, the c ...
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