Rod Escayola
Condo Liens: What is the Required Minimum Notice?
In a recent Ottawa case, the courts clarified how condo corporations are to calculate the minimum 10-day notice requirement prior to being able to register a lien on a defaulting unit. This post sheds some light on this tricky requirement. Are your condo fees too high? How do they compare? Help us take an accurate […]
Are your Condo Fees Too High?
Common expenses (commonly referred to as “condo fees”) are a recurring grievance for those living in condos. They seem to always go up; they seem to never cover enough and owners often feel they have no control over them. In this post we discuss what goes into the calculation of common expenses. NEW: Take our […]
Court Upholds Condo Smoking Ban
In what may be the first case of its kind (at least as it pertains to cannabis), the Québec Superior Court of Justice recently upheld the legality and enforceability of a condo rule preventing tobacco and cannabis smoking inside units and in enclosed common elements. This is good news for those wishing to enforce similar […]
Condos Must Notify Owners Before They Commence Lawsuits
In a recent decision, the court analyzed the circumstances under which a condo corporation must notify its owners of its intention to commence a lawsuit. In most cases, such a notification must be provide before the lawsuit is even commenced. Failure to do so may invalidate the legal proceeding. This can have dire consequences if, in […]
Can Condo Boards Take Decisions by Email?
Our last post on whether condo owners could access Board emails triggered quite the reaction from our readers. Many wondered whether condo boards could take decisions secretarially, by email, between meetings. Here’s the answer. In theory, the answer is “no”…. But what about in practice though? Read on. Are your condo fees too high? How do […]
Not all Condo By-laws Require an Absolute Majority to Pass
As most of our readers know, condominium by-laws in Ontario can only be adopted if approved by at least a majority of all registered units. But this is not true of all by-laws. Some can be adopted by a “simple majority”. This post is about those. What’s a by-law? We’ve blog already on the difference between […]
No Gender Parity on Condo Boards
Earlier this month, CBC published an article on gender parity on corporate boards across Canada. Its findings were surprising and it made us wonder whether condo boards fared better in Ontario. You may be surprised by the results of our research. Inequities in the corporate world As reported by the CBC, according to Statistics Canada, […]
Condo Owners not Entitled to the Email Addresses of Other Owners
Over the years, there has been much debate over whether condo owners have a right to access the email addresses of other owners. Just as we were last blogging on this, the Condo Authority Tribunal was hearing a case on this exact topic. If there was any doubt, we now know: condo owners are not entitled […]
Do Police Need a Warrant to Investigate on Common Elements (Part II)
In this series of posts, we are exploring the question of whether condo corporations can (or should) assist police in the context of an ongoing investigation. [Have a look at our more recent blog post on this issue] In our prior posts, we reviewed two cases where police entered onto common elements for the purpose […]