A couple pays for works twice so as not to lose their house

The current Minister of Justice Simon Jolin-Barrette made a commitment in September 2018, during a report by The bill, to modify the provisions in order to better protect consumers, like this couple from Sainte-Marthe-sur-le-Lac. But nothing has yet been done about it, which deplores the president of the Chamber of Notaries of Quebec, Hélène Potvin.

” Nothing has changed since the release of the report. The provisions of the Civil Code are always the same. So yes, unfortunately, this situation could happen again. »

Money gone

In 2018, Raphaëlle Viau and Olivier Bélisle had their very first house built by Habitex Construction. After the signing of the deed of sale at the notary and the complete delivery of the sale price, that is $329,000, their nightmare begins.

The doorbell of their new home rang incessantly as bailiffs followed one another to give them notices of legal construction hypothecs. A document informing them that a subcontractor intends to register a mortgage on their house.

” Legal mortgage, we didn’t really know… Then we go on the Internet, we look. This is where we see that we got a little tricked. »

The couple understands that the money paid to Habitex Construction was not used to pay the subcontractors who built their house. These subcontractors therefore resort to a legal construction hypothec in order to be paid. They try to contact Kitty Tourangeau, the owner of the company, and Daniel Méthot, the project manager, without success. They disappeared.

Notary’s work called into question

The work of the notary is then pointed out since, in their deed of sale, it is clearly stated that the sub-contractors have all been paid, which is not true.

” I don’t think we were adequately protected. I would have thought that when buying a new house, the notary would have been there to do this type of verification. »

However, the current provisions of the Civil Code of Quebec governing legal construction hypothecs do not allow notaries to know whether subcontractors have been paid. Indeed, until the end of the work, the buyer can only rely on the good faith of his contractor to know whether the invoices of the subcontractors have been paid.

” There is an imbalance of forces where construction contractors have more rights and the consumer does not have the means to defend himself. »

Do everything not to lose their house

For Raphaëlle and Olivier, the threat of losing their home was very real. In order to prevent subcontractors from seizing their house and then selling it and paying themselves the sale price, the couple fought a long battle with their lawyer.

” It’s a war against legal hypothecs that we are waging at the moment, in addition to that at the same time, we are fighting against our contractor. »

Over the past three years, the couple has negotiated with certain subcontractors, sometimes successfully, while other mortgages have been canceled because the deadlines provided for in the Civil Code of Quebec had not been respected. They still had to pay $35,000 out of the $80,000 they were asked to pay, even though they had already paid that amount at the time of purchase. And that’s not including attorney’s fees.

15 recommendations to protect consumers

In the spring of 2021, in order to remedy the situation, the Chambre des notaires du Québec submitted an expert report to the Ministère de la Justice du Québec with 15 recommendations. (New window). The goal: to restore a better balance between players in the construction and renovation community and consumers.

Two of the proposed recommendations could have avoided the nightmare experienced by Raphaëlle and Olivier. The first suggests that a subcontractor who would like to avail himself of the rights of a legal construction hypothec be obliged to disclose his contract to the land register, explains Ms. Potvin, president of the Chambre des notaires du Québec. And that would really make it possible to have information on the companies that worked on the construction of the residence.

The second recommendation that would have changed everything for the couple is to limit the time to register a legal construction hypothec. So what we are proposing is that it is no longer possible for a mortgage to be registered once the general contractor has sold the property to the consumersummarizes Ms. Potvin.

Thus, no more unpleasant surprises once you have gone to the notary, as was the case with Habitex Construction clients.

Other recommendations deal with the prohibition to seize the main residence for a debt of less than $20,000 or the creation of an administrative housing tribunal to hear claims relating to property owners.

Commitment not kept by Simon Jolin-Barrette

If the Chamber of Notaries has decided to act, on the government side, the file is still at the analysis stage.

In the fall of 2018, while Quebec was in the middle of an election campaign, The bill had in particular challenged Simon Jolin-Barrette, then deputy of the CAQ, on the solution proposed by the Chamber of notaries, that is to say that the notary ensures that the subcontractors have been paid.

He then said he was in favor of the proposal and pledged to better protect consumers. The proposal by the Chambre des notaires seems to us to be a reasonable proposal which aims to protect the public and ensure that both the subcontractors are paid, that the promoter is paid, but also that the citizen is protected when he makes one of the biggest purchases of his life, buying a house.

So yes, the CAQ is committed to modifying the rules associated with the legal hypothecaffirmed Simon Jolin-Barrette.

Asked about the progress of this file, the Minister’s office replied in an email that the question of legal construction hypothecs represents a particularly sensitive file for the Minister, but that it is a complex file. It is explained that stakeholders in the community have been consulted and surveyed, but that the work is still in progress.

When I see the consequences in your report, we can’t give up the fightdeclares Hélène Potvin, president of the Chambre des notaires du Québec. Things have to change. Then I have high hopes that we will succeed in convincing the government to act quickly. So we don’t give up. We continue our work.