Renting in Quebec as an international student

Quebec rental law resembles almost nowhere else. Rules that are obvious back home, or even in another Canadian province, are simply wrong here: the lease does not end on its end date, security deposits are banned, and leaving early is not something you settle by paying a penalty.

Most of these rules protect the tenant. The catch is that they assume you know them: several are triggered by a written notice you have to send months in advance. This page walks through the traps in the order they usually catch people. It is general information, not legal advice.

Why the Quebec lease surprises everyone

Elsewhere, a 12-month lease ends on its end date: you leave, or you sign a new one. In Quebec it works the other way around. Article 1936 of the Civil Code gives every tenant a personal right to remain in the dwelling, and says a tenant may be evicted only in the cases provided by law. Article 1941 turns that right into automatic renewal of a fixed-term lease, on the same conditions.

The lease doesn't stop, in other words: it continues, unless someone takes a specific step within a specific window. That is powerful protection if you are staying, because the landlord cannot ask you to leave on the grounds that "the lease is over". It is a trap if you are leaving, because saying nothing counts as renewing.

Trap 1: the lease renews itself

A lease running from 1 July to 30 June does not end on 30 June. Under article 1941 it renews for another 12 months at the same rent, with no formality required from you. If the initial lease runs longer than 12 months, the renewal is for 12 months.

To stop that renewal, article 1946 requires a tenant who has not received a modification notice to send a notice of non-renewal, within the same time limits the landlord must respect for a modification notice (article 1942). Those limits depend on the length of the lease:

In practice, for a lease ending 30 June, the notice has to go out between 1 January and 31 March. Sent in April it is too late; sent in December it is too early. This is the window students miss most often, because it opens in the middle of the winter term, long before leaving is on anyone's mind.

Missing it costs real money: the lease renews and you owe the next year's rent, even if you have left the country. Since the time limits run from when the notice is received, keep proof of the date: that is what decides whether your notice landed inside the window.

Trap 2: finishing your studies is not a ground for termination

Article 1974 lists the cases where a tenant may end a lease already under way: being allocated low-rental housing, relocation ordered by the court, a handicap that prevents you from occupying the dwelling, or the permanent admission of an elderly person to a care facility. Article 1974.1 adds situations of violence. Finishing your degree, going home, an expiring permit, an internship in another city: none of them appear on that list.

There is no "3-month penalty" that lets you buy your way out either. The real exit is assignment of the lease. Article 1870 lets a tenant assign the lease by notifying the landlord, giving the name and address of the person they intend to assign to, and obtaining the landlord's consent. Article 1871 frames that consent: the landlord cannot refuse without a serious reason, and must give the reasons within 15 days of receiving the notice, failing which the landlord is deemed to have consented.

The difference between assigning and subletting is the one students misunderstand most, and it is the most expensive to get wrong. Article 1873 provides that assignment of the lease discharges the former tenant from their obligations. Subletting discharges you from nothing: you remain liable to the landlord for the rent if your subtenant stops paying.

• You are leaving for good (end of studies, going home): assignment is what you want, because it releases you
• You are leaving temporarily and coming back (summer internship, a term abroad): subletting fits, but you stay liable
• Either way, the notice to the landlord must name the person and give their address
• Landlord silence for 15 days counts as consent

Trap 3: the security deposit does not exist in Quebec

This is probably the rule most often broken against newcomers, and it is categorical. Article 1904 prohibits the landlord from requiring instalments greater than one month's rent, from requiring more in advance than the first term of rent, from requiring any sum of money other than rent whether as a deposit or otherwise, and from requiring a postdated cheque or other postdated instrument.

Each of these requests, routine elsewhere, is illegal here:

• A security or damage deposit, whatever it is called
• Last month's rent paid up front at signing
• Postdated cheques covering the months ahead
• A key deposit, a pet deposit, or a fee to "reserve" the apartment
• Several months in advance because you have no Quebec credit history

Only the first month's rent can be required. If you have already handed over one of these amounts, it is not lost: you can apply to the Tribunal administratif du logement to get it back. Keep your proof of payment and any written exchange, email or text message, where the amount was demanded.

Trap 4: you may be paying more than the legal rent

A newcomer has no way of knowing what the previous tenant paid, and that is exactly what the law corrects. Article 1896 requires the landlord, when the lease is entered into, to give the new tenant a notice stating the lowest rent paid during the 12 months before the lease started. That is section G of the mandatory lease form.

Article 1950 supplies the remedy: a new tenant paying more than the lowest rent of the preceding 12 months can apply to have the rent fixed by the tribunal. The application must be made within 10 days of entering into the lease. That limit stretches to two months from the start of the lease if the landlord never gave you the notice, and to two months from when you learn the truth if the notice contained a false statement.

That detail decides a lot of cases: a landlord who leaves section G blank does not close the window, they widen it. Article 1896 also allows punitive damages where the notice contains a false statement or the landlord knowingly fails to give it. If you signed without ever seeing this information, check your lease start date before concluding it is too late.

Trap 5: ask for your copy of the lease

Article 1895 requires the landlord, within 10 days of the lease being entered into, to give the tenant a copy of the lease. The lease has to be made on the form whose use is made mandatory by government regulation: it is not a contract the landlord drafts however they like.

A verbal lease is valid in Quebec, but it exempts nobody from anything: the landlord must then give you a writing stating their name and address, your name, the rent and the address of the dwelling, with the particulars prescribed by regulation. That writing forms part of the lease. Without a copy you have no way to prove what you agreed to, or to check what section G actually said.

Refusals based on origin, language, or no credit history

Section 10 of the Charter of human rights and freedoms prohibits distinction, exclusion or preference based on, among other grounds, race, colour, religion, language, and ethnic or national origin. Refusing housing on one of those grounds is discrimination, and it is reported to the Commission des droits de la personne et des droits de la jeunesse.

In practice the refusal is often dressed up as a financial requirement: a Quebec guarantor, proof of local employment, six months of rent up front. The money side of those demands already falls under article 1904, whatever reason is given: having no credit history creates no exception to the one-month ceiling.

Article 1899 of the Civil Code adds a separate protection: a landlord may not refuse to grant a lease, refuse to maintain a person in their rights, or impose more onerous conditions on them for the sole reason that they are pregnant or have children, nor for the sole reason that they exercised a right under the Code or under the Act respecting the Tribunal administratif du logement. Punitive damages may be awarded.

What has to go in a dated writing

Nearly everything above turns on a date: the notice of non-renewal inside its 3-to-6-month window, the assignment notice and the landlord's 15 days to answer, the 10 days or two months to challenge the rent. In each case the first thing disputed is not the content, it is the date.

So keep a record of everything you send, by a method that establishes when it was received. For a disagreement that persists, repairs never done, a deposit demanded illegally, an assignment refused without serious reason, a demand letter is the written step that comes before an application to the Tribunal.

Frequently asked questions