It’s been four weeks since Peyton Schroeder moved out of Toronto and into a single-family home on the west end of Sault Ste. Maria to start a new job.
Now, he wishes he had never signed a lease in the first place.
“I mean, everything was great. I saw the pictures of my house. I didn’t get a chance to come and see it, but I saw all the pictures and everything — everything looked good, and then I moved in,” Schroeder said. “There’s this huge crack in my roof and a lot of appliances weren’t working.” Schroeder says almost everything about the property was “unacceptable” upon arrival. In addition to a cracked, leaking roof, the dishwasher and burner on her stove didn’t work, and several outlet covers were missing. There was no carbon monoxide detector or smoke detector. RWC Management, a southern Ontario-based property management company that currently manages the property, ended up sending workers to repair the roof last week — but only after threatening to hold them liable for damages if the roof leaked again. “This is just scratching the surface and I’m paying close to $2,000 a month plus utilities,” Schroeder said. “It is incredible.” Schroeder’s rental home is actually one of 51 properties in the Sault owned by DSPLN Inc., a company based in Burlington, Ont. Land registry records obtained by SooToday show a company director, Aruba Butt, signed off on the $185,000 purchase last year. But DSPLN Inc. isn’t the only company Butt is associated with in Sault Ste. Mary.
She’s also listed as a director of Zack Files Real Estate Inc., which has bought seven properties in the city, including 134 Gore Street — a property that, as SooToday previously reported, is overrun with squatters and without running water because of people. entering the building and stripping it of copper piping. Records show all seven properties were purchased by Zack Files Real Estate late last year for $2.65 million. Another company that lists Butt as a director – Happy Gilmore Inc. – has purchased 30 properties in the Sault, mostly in the west end and downtown core. According to publicly available incorporation documents, Ryan Molony, president of RWC Management, is listed as the company’s other director. Happy Gilmore Inc. made headlines last month after city law officers targeted one of the company’s vacant properties on Wellington St. E. At the time, councilor Luke Dufour called the owners “white-collar squatters” who buy homes in the Sault with no intention of properly maintaining them. In all, SooToday has so far been able to locate 88 local properties purchased by Butt’s out-of-town companies: Zack Files Real Estate, DSPLN Inc. and Happy Gilmore Inc. Zack Files Real Estate, RWC Management, SID Developments and SID Reno’s — all based in the greater Toronto area and southern Ontario — are linked as part of the “SID family,” according to SID Reno’s website. Robert ‘Robby’ Clark is listed as the founder and managing director of SID Developments. He is also listed as the founder of RWC Management on his Instagram profile, which has more than 400,000 followers. Widely regarded as an influencer through his Instagram videos of self-help and business advice, Clark was also known for his childhood acting career, appearing in a number of television series (including The Zack Files), films made for TV and in a small role in the 1999 film Superstar starring Molly Shannon and Will Ferrell. In a sponsored article that appeared in USA Today last year, Clark claimed that SID’s real estate portfolio consists of more than $150 million in holdings across Ontario. Clark also uses the same article to claim that he is “currently buying more residential homes than anyone in Canada” and aims to acquire more than $1 billion in real estate by the end of 2022. “Yeah, we’re in it to make money,” Clark is quoted as saying in the sponsored article. “But by buying and renovating specific properties in areas of Ontario that are neglected when it comes to capital investment, we add value to the region and help alleviate the ongoing rental housing crisis. We’re also removing a lot of the poor sterns that are there, finding those depressing qualities and bringing them back to life.” Meanwhile, the southern Ontario companies associated with Clark haven’t exactly been model corporate citizens here in Sault Ste. Marie, where Schroeder moved into a house that was in a constant state of disrepair. “It was a struggle,” he said. SooToday reached out to both Butt and Clark for comment via email Monday. They haven’t responded yet.