You Fired Your Building Superintendent. No, You Can’t Just Change the Locks — How Ontario’s RTA Really Handles a Super’s Unit
A rent-free “staff unit” is not a dorm the employer controls. Under Ontario’s Residential Tenancies Act a superintendent’s premises is a rental unit: the tenancy ends the day the job does, the super gets one week to leave, and you can charge nothing for it — but you still need the Board to evict. The employee housing that truly sits outside the Act is the farm worker’s.
Your building superintendent has been let go and won’t leave the suite that came with the job. The locks are right there. Before you touch them — what does Ontario’s Residential Tenancies Act say that unit actually is?
Start at the finish line, because that’s where employers stumble: even after you’ve let the super go, the only party who can actually put them out is the Landlord and Tenant Board. Work backward from that and the rest falls into place.
It ends at the Board because it began as a tenancy. Ontario’s Residential Tenancies Act defines a superintendent's premises in s.2(1) as a kind of rental unit, and it writes a licence to occupy right into the meaning of tenancy agreement — so “we only granted a licence” fails, and so does “they paid no rent.”
What the Act does hand you is speed, all of it in Part V. Under s.93 the tenancy terminates the same day the employment ends (unless you agreed otherwise), the super has one week to clear out, and you can charge nothing for that week. But s.94 still routes the last step — physically removing anyone who stays — through a Form L2, never through the locks.
The employee housing Ontario truly writes out of the Act is the other kind: s.5(b) puts accommodation tied to continued employment on a farm entirely outside the RTA. That is the real exemption — and a building super is on the far side of it.
Sources: Residential Tenancies Act, 2006, S.O. 2006, c. 17, ss. 2(1), 5(b), 93, 94 (Ontario e-Laws, current to Aug 2026); Landlord and Tenant Board, Form L2 Instructions (Reason 3 — superintendent’s premises).
I’m Arthur Zhao. Representing landlords, I’ve watched the same reflex play out for years: the superintendent is let go, and the employer treats the unit that came with the job like company property to be repossessed on the spot. It feels obvious — staff housing, staff rules.
It’s also where the trouble starts. Under the Residential Tenancies Act that suite is a rental unit and the super is a tenant, rent or no rent. The Act’s answer isn’t to strip that protection away; it’s to hand the landlord a much faster exit than an ordinary tenancy allows — the tenancy ends the day the employment does, and the unit is meant to be empty within a week. That speed is a gift. What sinks employers is reading “faster” as “self-serve,” and reaching for the locks instead of the process. Everything below is aimed at that one wrong turn.
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The two hats a superintendent wears
Start with the tension that makes this whole question tricky. Out in the building, a superintendent stands on the landlord’s side of the line: the Residential Tenancies Act repeatedly groups the landlord, the superintendent or the landlord’s agent together — in the tenant-complaint provisions (for example s.29(1)), a super can be named personally as a respondent for how they treated someone else’s unit. So in your other tenants’ apartments, the super is “management.”
But step into the one unit the super actually lives in — the superintendent’s premises — and the same person is now a tenant, protected by the very Act they help you administer. Almost every mistake employers make here comes from seeing only the first hat and forgetting the second.
Is it a tenancy at all? Three assumptions that get employers sued
Employers reach for three theories to argue the super’s unit is outside the tenant rulebook. All three fail.
The most common is the exemption mix-up: “staff housing isn’t covered by the Act.” One narrow class of employee housing genuinely is exempt — but it’s the farm worker’s, not the building super’s (more on that below). Next comes the licence dodge: “we granted a licence to occupy, not a lease.” The Act closes that door in s.2(1), where the definition of tenancy agreement expressly includes a licence to occupy a rental unit. Last is the free-rent theory: “they pay nothing, so they can’t be a tenant.” But s.2(1) defines tenant with an open-ended “includes,” and it separately defines a superintendent’s premises as a rental unit — paying rent is one way in, not the only door. Three theories, one shared error: mistaking a special set of rules for no rules at all.
Ordinary tenant vs. superintendent’s premises: the difference is speed
⚠️The lever in all of this is the phrase “unless otherwise agreed” in s.93(1). Want the person to stay on as an ordinary tenant, or to have more than a week? Get it in writing before the job ends — say nothing, and the same-day, one-week fast-track is exactly what you’re left with.
Part V, in plain terms: the job and the housing are tied together
Part V of the Act (“Superintendent’s Premises”) governs these units, and its logic is simple: the home came with the job, so when the job ends, the right to the home changes with it. Under s.93(1), once a landlord has entered a tenancy agreement for a superintendent’s premises, the tenancy terminates on the day the employment ends — unless otherwise agreed. Those last three words matter: the parties can contract for something different, for instance agreeing in writing that the person stays on as an ordinary tenant after the job, or that they get a longer runway. Absent such an agreement, the default is same-day termination.
One week — and you can charge nothing for it
The clock after that is short. Section 93(2) requires the tenant to vacate the superintendent’s premises within one week of the tenancy ending. This isn’t a notice period — the tenancy already ended on the last day of work; the week is simply time to move out. And s.93(3) bars the landlord from charging rent or compensation for that one-week window. If the suite was rent-free to begin with, the practical meaning is that you can’t suddenly invent an “occupancy fee” for that final week either — the cost of that week is zeroed out by statute.
The line you cannot cross: only the Board evicts (s.94)
Here is where employers get themselves into real trouble. Even after the tenancy has auto-terminated and the week has run, you still cannot change the locks, cut utilities, or move the super’s belongings out. Under s.94, if the tenant hasn’t vacated within one week of the employment ending, the landlord applies to the Landlord and Tenant Board using a Form L2 (the superintendent’s-premises ground is Reason 3 on the form) for an order terminating the tenancy and evicting. No N-notice is required first — the tenancy ended by operation of law — but the one actor who can physically put someone out is always the Board, never the employer.
🚨Act on your own here and you change sides. Reclaim the unit yourself — locks, utilities, belongings — instead of through the Board, and the former super becomes the one holding a valid application while you become the party facing an order and penalties. Section 94 has no “but they worked for me” exception; an auto-terminated tenancy is not permission to evict yourself.
The employee housing that truly is exempt: the farm worker (s.5(b))
So which employee housing does Ontario actually place outside the Act? The answer is a useful contrast. Section 5(b) says the RTA does not apply to living accommodation whose occupancy is conditional upon the occupant continuing to be employed on a farm, whether or not the accommodation is located on that farm. That is a true exemption — no Part V fast-track, no one-week rule, no L2, because the Act simply doesn’t reach it. A building superintendent’s unit is the opposite: squarely inside the Act, just running on special rules. If you take one distinction away from this piece, make it this one — farm-tied housing is out; a super’s unit is in.
💡 Here’s my honest read. The risk in these situations almost never comes from the legal question of whether the super is a “tenant” — it comes from an employer acting on instinct and skipping straight to self-help. The fast-track is genuinely landlord-friendly: the tenancy ends the day the job does, the unit clears in a week, and that week costs the occupant nothing. You just have to actually walk the path. The move that turns a clean situation into a losing one is “he’s an employee, I’ll just change the locks” — the moment you cross s.94, you flip from the party in the right to the party breaking the law, and the former super can apply against you. So keep it simple: give the full week, charge nothing for it, and if they haven’t gone, file the L2 like everyone else. The speed is a gift from the statute; crossing the line is a wound you inflict on yourself. When the facts get complicated — a written deal to stay on, or an unpaid-wages dispute tangled in — get a licensed professional to sort it before you act.
- Residential Tenancies Act, 2006, S.O. 2006, c. 17, s. 2(1) — definitions of superintendent’s premises, tenancy agreement (includes a licence to occupy) and tenant
- RTA, 2006, s. 5(b) — farm-employment-conditional accommodation excluded from the Act
- RTA, 2006, Part V, ss. 93-94 — termination on end of employment, one-week vacate, no rent for that week, and application to the Board
- Landlord and Tenant Board, Form L2 Instructions — Reason 3, superintendent’s premises
Renting an Unregistered Basement Unit in Ontario: Does the RTA Still Protect You If the Unit Is Illegal? →Living With Landlord Rta →Why a “No Pets” Clause Is Void in Ontario Leases — and Why That Doesn’t Mean Anything Goes →First-Time Renter Guide →
Frequently Asked Questions
The week is up and the super still won’t leave — can I change the locks now?
No. An auto-terminated tenancy still isn’t a licence to evict yourself. Once the one week under s.93(2) has passed and the unit is still occupied, s.94 sends you to the Landlord and Tenant Board on a Form L2 (Reason 3 — superintendent’s premises); the Board issues the order, and only the Board carries it out. Changing locks, cutting utilities, or moving belongings is illegal self-help that the former super can turn around and file against you.
Is there a notice period, or do I go straight to the L2?
Straight to the L2. Because s.93(1) terminates the tenancy automatically on the last day of employment, there’s no N-notice step the way an ordinary tenancy has. You wait out the one-week vacate period, and if the unit isn’t clear you file Form L2 under s.94. The auto-termination is what lets you skip the notice — it’s not what lets you skip the Board.
The super never paid rent — how can they be a tenant at all?
Because rent was never the test. Section 2(1) defines a superintendent’s premises as a rental unit outright, and defines tenant with an open-ended “includes” — paying rent is one route in, not the only door. A licence to occupy is folded into the definition of tenancy agreement too, so neither “it’s free” nor “it’s just a licence” pulls the unit out of the Act.
Can I recover anything for that final week, or set it off against unpaid wages?
Section 93(3) bars any rent or compensation for the one-week period, so if the suite was free you can’t invent an occupancy charge for it either. A wage dispute is a separate matter on its own footing — you don’t get to net it out of that last week of housing.
We’d actually like to keep the person living there after the job ends — how do we do that?
Use the “unless otherwise agreed” door in s.93(1). The default is same-day termination, but the parties can contract for something different — for example, agreeing in writing that the person stays on as an ordinary tenant, or gets a longer runway than a week. Put it in writing before the employment ends; what you can’t do is switch the RTA off entirely.
Arthur Zhao
Real Estate Broker · FRI · ABR · SRS · PSA · MCNE · E-PRO · CLHMS & GUILD Elite · REAIS
VP & Branch Manager, Bay Street Group Inc.
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