Great title, lousy article. At least that is how many of you will feel when you read this hoping to find an easy way to collect money from tenants you have evicted. Although some people have had success with collecting money from evicted tenants, unless the outstanding amount owed is over a couple thousand dollars you may be better off letting it go.

The time and energy you waste trying to collect could probably better serve you by spending extra time finding and screening for exceptional tenants to replace the less than stellar former inhabitants. For those of you looking to collect, though here is some information to help you with the process of either garnishing a former tenant’s wages, or potentially seizing tenant’s assets to pay outstanding deb.

If you are planning on doing this yourself, here is the link to the governments PDF on Getting and Collecting a Writ of Enforcement in Alberta. This 40 page document (yes 40 pages!!) walks you through the various forms and processes, but most importantly, it says this.

“Legal enforcement of a Judgment is often complex and difficult. Many aspects of creditor law and legal procedure have not been explained in this brochure. Court employees are not allowed to give you legal advice. Please consult a lawyer if you have any questions.”

They also include the phone number for the Lawyer Referral Service sponsored by the Law Society of Alberta which is 1-800-661-1095 or can be found at this link, Law Society of Alberta Lawyer Referral Service. You can receive up to half an hour free legal counsel by using this service. Once you have received some advice you can decide at that point whether to pay for additional advice or whether it may be worth it for you.

Due to the complexity, the other option is to have one of the collection/bailiff services do the process for you. Costs for this start at about $700 and can move upwards for additional services, so be sure you are receive a breakdown of what the potential charges will be prior to committing to anything.

Also, this is different from simply sending the tenant to a simple collection agency that attempts to collect outstanding money for a percentage of the debt. Companies like Foster and Co, Kurseshi and Company or Serv-it offer the full service of going through the courts and garnishing wages and can offload the time you would spend on the process.

If you have had experience collecting, or attempting to collect from former tenants, we would love to hear your thoughts on the process.

I receive a considerable amount of emails and searches on our blog regarding evictions every week and quite often, it is the same or very similar questions. Here is a list of my top five eviction questions to help you out.

1) Alberta Eviction Question One – Can a tenant be evicted in the winter in Alberta?

• a. It’s cold outside, the weather can be frightful, but yes if a tenant doesn’t pay their rent or causes a serious breach of the rental agreement they can be evicted. The tenant and the landlord have a contract that both sides have to uphold and is regulated under the Residential Tenancies Act of Alberta.

2) Alberta Eviction Question Two – Can a landlord cut-off utilities to make a tenant leave?

• a. Absolutely not, if the landlord shuts off heat, water or any other utility that he is responsible for paying they can be fined and find themselves in a very bad spot. The secondary question that comes with this is no, you cannot take the front door away for repair either, nor can you change the locks on the tenant without going through the proper procedures.

3) Alberta Eviction Question Three – How expensive is it to evict a tenant?

• a. If you go through the Residential Tenancy Dispute Resolution Service (RTDRS) there is a $75 filing fee to have a hearing. If the hearing officer decides in your favour, the tenant is responsible for paying you the $75. Unfortunately collecting the outstanding $75 can be much harder than winning the hearing. If you win the hearing and the tenant still does not vacate it can cost you another $400 to hire a bailiff and have the tenant removed.
• b. There are also full service eviction companies that will charge you from $600 to $1,000 and up for the service and depending on how much additional work is required the fee will continue to increase.

4) Alberta Eviction Question Four – Do I need a bailiff to evict a tenant?

• a. For most evictions, you can complete the entire process yourself through the RTDRS and may not require a bailiff. The only time during the eviction process that you absolutely require the bailiff is if the tenants receive an order from eviction and do not vacate the premises. At this point, you require a bailiff to serve the tenant(s) with the writ of possession which gives you your property back and allow you to legally change the locks and allow the police to charge the tenants with trespassing if they return.

5) Alberta Eviction Question Five – What is the fastest way to evict a tenant?

• a. Each circumstance is different, but generally, the quickest method is to file immediately with the RTDRS and get a hearing date. This will be the quickest sure fire method to evict a tenant. You can provide a 14 day eviction notice to a tenant, and then if it appears they will not be vacating you can file at RTDRS, but it will add an additional week or more to the process.
• b. In the case of a tenant causing serious damage to the property or threatening the landlord or other tenants, you can provide them with a 24 hour eviction notice. Once again, if they do not vacate you still have to file with the RTDRS and go through the process.

Hopefully these provide you with some answers that help you move forward, either as a landlord or as a tenant. As a bonus, here is one additional eviction question.
Alberta Eviction Bonus Question – How long does an eviction take?

• If you follow the systems we recommend (including properly screening tenants), a landlord can have their property back and the tenants evicted in approximately 15 days. Depending on the circumstances, the hearing officer may allow the tenant to stay on and make additional payments to catch up outstanding rent on a set schedule. If they miss any of the payments on this set schedule, you can take your property back within a few days.

If you are a landlord and found this site while you were searching for eviction help please take a minute to register so you can receive any further updates we have regarding evictions, landlording, and what is happening in the Alberta economy and Real Estate market. Click here to Register to receive updates.

I’m still working on a walkthrough to help landlords with evictions and updates on it will also be sent out as it nears completion. It will include hints and advice to help streamline the process and to make it most effective for landlords, so if you want to be in the loop be sure to register. Register to receive updates.

Finally if you have some eviction stories, insights or questions to leave me a comment and I will answer back as quickly as possible! HEre is some more additional eviction information for you;

The Eviction Process

The Eviction Process – an Extended Walkthrough of an Eviction

Police Tactical Visiting is a Great Reason To Evict!

Landlord Tips – Filling Vacancies and Saving Headaches!