Trinidad and Tobago: HDC intensifies evictions to recover $241.1M in unpaid rent

Trinidad and Tobago: The Housing Development Corporation in Trinidad and Tobago revealed that it is continuing their eviction drive as part of their strategy to retrieve around $241.1 million owed in unpaid rent.Camille Robinson-Regis, the Minister of Housing and Development shared the development and said that there will no forgiveness of debts which are owed negligent tenants and the continued execution of the eviction strategy will enhance the HDC’s collection of outstanding payments.

According to the information, as of April 30, 2024, the arrears of evicted tenants differing from $22,000 to $128,000, from periods ranging between 2. 5 years to seven years.

The HDC has said that the arrears comprised of rent to own $2,105,914.34, license to occupy unit $91,478,355.66, in-house mortgage units $67,712,621.19 and commercial units $3,690,186.92.The Minister noted that the collection drive had brought out significant results with an overall total of around $9 million collected from the irresponsible tenants in April 2024 and as HDC began the evictions, the average collection each month is around $6 million.She further continued to reveal that HDC has followed a structure and transparent process which makes sure that tenants on the heels of eviction will be receiving sufficient notices and several chances to address their arrears.It is to be noted that from 2009 to the present, there have been a total of 394 evictions from the Housing Development Corporation units, with the breakdown being as follows:2009 18 evictions 2010 20 evictions2011 28 evictions2012 33 evictions2013 0 evictions2014 0 evictions2015 8 evictions2016 15 evictions2017 80 evictions2018 14 evictions2019 90 evictions 2020 0 evictions2021 0 evictions2022 13 evictions2023 7 evictions2024 23 evictions thus far

Meanwhile, the HDC also added that this year, 5 of 23 evictions were for illegal occupancy of houses, 17 were for arrears, and 1 was for subletting. And in shocking news, out of the 394 evictions from 2019 to the present, 376 were for illegal occupancy.

Minister Robinson-Regis stated that the tenants who have been evicted this year for arrears form Cypress Housing Development, Vieux Fort Housing Development, Chaconia Crescent Housing Development, Diego Martin, San Fernando, St James, Union Hall and from Oropune Gardens.