Groups of tenants across Toronto are withholding rent payments

In the east Toronto neighbourhood of Thorncliffe Park, residents in three buildings have withheld rent since May, after their landlord proposed a five per cent increase for next year — and they're not alone.

In the nearly 10 years since first moving into her one-bedroom Toronto apartment, Beverley Henry's rent has climbed from 900-dollars a month to more than 13-hundred dollars.

Henry, a senior living on a pension, says if rent keeps going up, she's going to have decide if she pays her rent on time, or buys food.

Henry and a number of her neighbours at 33 King Street in Toronto's west end are among tenants at several buildings in the city who have gone on a rent strike to protest what they say is unfair treatment by their landlords.

Henry and some other residents of her building stopped paying rent in June, while tenants in nearby 22 John Street joined the rent strike this month.

READ MORE: More than 300 tenants at 2 Toronto apartment buildings have stopped paying rent

In the east Toronto neighbourhood of Thorncliffe Park, residents in three buildings have withheld rent since May, after their landlord proposed a five per cent increase for next year.