The Canadian Mortgage and Housing Corporation has announced that the Canada Emergency Commercial Rent Assistance (CECRA) program has been extended to cover the month of August!
What you need to know:
- If an impacted tenant was eligible for rent assistance for the April to June period based on revenue decline, they are automatically eligible for the month of August
- There is no need for the tenants to reassess their revenue for August or July
- If an application has already been submitted and approved for April to June, the landlord simply has to opt-in to an extension for the month of August through the application portal on the CMHC website
- Not all tenants included in the prior applications need to be included in the extension
- No new tenants can be added to the rent reduction application
- Rent reduction for the month of August is based on the average rent for the April to June period
- Rent reduction agreements do not need to be amended, however communication needs to be sent to tenants detailing that the rent reduction has been extended to include the month of August under the same terms as the previous rent reduction agreement
Reminders:
- July extension – CECRA was extended to include the month of July. If you haven’t already applied, you can opt-in to the July extension under the same conditions as above extension for August;
- Calculating the drop in revenue for eligibility for the program – to be eligible for the program, tenants must attest that:
- Average gross monthly revenue for April, May and June 2020 has dropped by 70% compared to April, May and June 2019, or
- Where a business was not operating in 2019, average gross monthly revenue for April, May and June 2020 has dropped by at least 70% compared to the average revenues for January and February 2020.
Key dates:
- Deadline to submit any new applications is August 31, 2020
- Deadline to submit July and August extensions is September 14, 2020
