This is the question that stops most interns and international students halfway through an application. You are on a stipend rather than a salary, you have no Canadian credit history, and your parents are in another country and possibly another currency.
The good news is that the guarantor is not the point. It is one way of answering a question, and there are others.
General guidance, not legal advice — practices differ between landlords, and this describes how we handle it.
What the landlord is actually asking
Strip the paperwork away and there is one question underneath: is the rent going to arrive every four weeks for the length of this term?
A guarantor answers it by adding a second person who is liable if you do not pay. That is why guarantors are asked for by default from anyone without an established local income — it is the simplest single answer, not the only acceptable one.
Once you see it that way, the question changes from “how do I find a guarantor” to “what else answers the question as well”.
What we accept instead
On our application you tell us how the rent will be covered. The answers we work with include:
- A student loan — the funding is confirmed and scheduled.
- A job, including a placement that pays.
- A sponsor — an organisation, a scholarship, a family member abroad who is funding you rather than co-signing.
- A parent standing as guarantor, if that is the easiest route for you.
A guarantor is not automatically required. Tell us the situation and we work with what you have. That sentence is the whole policy, and it exists because most of both buildings fills each September with people who are not yet in Canada and do not yet have a Canadian anything.
What to put in the application if you are on a stipend
Be specific rather than reassuring. Vague confidence is harder to accept than a modest but documented arrangement.
- The amount and the schedule. What the stipend pays, how often, and for how many months.
- Who pays it — the university, the hospital, the lab, the company.
- The dates your placement starts and ends, against the dates you want the room.
- Anything that covers the gap, if the stipend starts after your move-in date. Savings, a first month paid up front, a sponsor covering the start.
- A guarantor, if you happen to have one easily. Not a prerequisite — just one fewer thing to discuss.
The pattern to aim for: a landlord reading your application should be able to trace where each four-weekly payment comes from without asking a follow-up question.
What you pay before you move in
One security deposit at signing, and nothing else. Under Alberta’s Residential Tenancies Act a security deposit is capped at one month’s rent and comes back with interest after you move out and the room is inspected.
There is no application fee and no service fee, so applying and being asked a follow-up question costs you nothing.
The deposit amount is on each room’s page because it differs by room — the rooms page has all seven.
If the answer is still no
If a landlord insists on a Canadian guarantor and you do not have one, ask what else they would accept: rent paid several periods in advance, a larger deposit within the legal cap, a letter from the funding body. Some will move; some will not. That is a reason to ask early rather than to give up — and it is one more argument for starting the search before you are under time pressure.
The short version
Ask rather than assume. The requirement is evidence, not a specific person, and a stipend with a named payer and dates is evidence.
If you are arranging a June-to-August placement, the summer term runs on the Deluxe and Flex Plus rooms at Garneau Towers, and the step-by-step timeline sets out when each part of this needs to happen. Or just ask us before you fill anything in.
