Your Tenant Charges an EV on Your Hydro Bill: What an Ontario Landlord Can and Can’t Do

A cord from the garage outlet, a new Level 2 charger, a signed agreement: at each step the money, the permission and the electrical work follow different rules.

I’m Arthur Zhao, a real estate broker in Toronto. Picture an email that lands a couple of months before a lease anniversary: “We’re planning to buy an electric car this summer. Can we charge it from the outlet in the garage? And down the road, would you be open to us putting in a proper charger?”

The rent on this unit includes hydro. So the landlord’s first thought is the bill, and the second is the wiring. Both are fair. But the answer to each depends less on the car than on how it will be charged. A cord from an outlet that already exists, a new dedicated circuit, and a written agreement each pull in a different set of rules. It is worth knowing which set you are in before you hit reply.

First layer: a cord from the outlet that’s already in the garage

Nothing new gets built here. The Electrical Safety Authority (ESA) describes Level 1 charging as a charger that “uses a standard 120 Volt household outlet,” the slowest way to charge. The car simply becomes one more thing plugged into the unit.

The money. If the lease says hydro is included, electricity is part of what the rent pays for. Section 134(1)(a) of the RTA prohibits a landlord from collecting, or attempting to collect, “a fee, premium, commission, bonus, penalty, key deposit or other like amount of money,” unless a regulation allows it. The exemption list in O. Reg. 516/06 s.17 covers items such as extra keys and NSF charges; nothing on it concerns electricity. A renewal email that says “charging is fine, but it’s extra each month” also runs into s.134(1)(b), which bars making payment for goods or services a condition of continuing to let the tenant occupy the unit. And under s.135(1), a tenant can apply to the Landlord and Tenant Board for an order that the landlord pay back money collected in contravention of the Act.

Who can stop it. The RTA has no section on vehicle charging. Whether a landlord can forbid plugging in therefore turns on the lease and on s.22, which bars a landlord from substantially interfering with the tenant’s reasonable enjoyment of the unit or the residential complex “for all usual purposes.” If the lease gives the tenant the garage and its outlet and says nothing against vehicles, a flat ban could be challenged under that section. If the lease excludes the garage, the starting point is different. The Act doesn’t decide this in advance, and nobody should tell you it does.

Who installs what. Nothing gets installed, but the circuit still matters. ESA’s EV charger factsheet tells owners to use a dedicated circuit, “otherwise it may draw too much power too quickly for your home,” and to keep the charging cable off the floor. If the garage outlet shares a circuit with other loads, that is the situation the factsheet is warning about. A licensed electrician can tell you which it is. That is a safety conversation, separate from the money one.

Second layer: a dedicated outlet or a Level 2 charger

Now the question is no longer only about rent; it’s about your building. According to ESA, Level 2 stations “have about the same requirements as a large household appliance like a stove or dryer (240 Volts / 30 Amps).”

The electrical rules. Ontario’s Electrical Safety Code, adopted by O. Reg. 164/99, requires every act or omission connected with the use of electricity in Ontario to comply with that Code. For chargers specifically, ESA states that “all EV charger installations require an electrical permit to be filed before work starts.” The permit is also called a notification of work, and ESA says a Licensed Electrical Contractor must file it. Once the work is accepted, the contractor provides an ESA Certificate of Acceptance; the factsheet notes a home insurer may ask for it. If the panel can’t carry the extra load, ESA says an upgrade may be needed and the local utility may have to be contacted.

Who can stop it. No section of the RTA gives a tenant a right to install a charger, and no section mentions one. The work happens on the landlord’s panel and wiring, so if the lease says nothing about alterations, the practical answer is that nobody books a contractor until the two of you have agreed in writing.

Who pays for the work. The RTA doesn’t allocate the cost of installing a charger. Who pays, who owns the equipment, and what happens to it at the end of the tenancy are things to write down before the work starts. Section 34 makes a tenant responsible for repairing “undue damage” caused by wilful or negligent conduct. That is a narrow rule. On its own it does not answer who removes a charger that was installed properly, with your agreement.

The hydro, again. A new charger doesn’t rewrite the lease. If hydro is included, the electricity the charger draws is still covered by the rent unless the two of you sign the kind of agreement described in the next layer.

Plugging in vs installing: what actually changes

Third layer: putting EV charging in writing under section 123

Section 123(1) lets a landlord increase the rent “at any time” if the landlord and the tenant agree that the landlord will add a parking space or a prescribed service, facility, privilege, accommodation or thing. Section 123(2) says this applies despite s.116 (the 90-day written notice rule) and s.119 (the 12-month rule).

What’s on the list. According to O. Reg. 516/06 s.16(1), twelve items are prescribed. Among them: “extra electricity for an air conditioner” (item 4), “extra electricity for a washer or dryer in the rental unit” (item 5), “blockheater plug-ins” (item 6), and plain “electricity” (item 9). Vehicles are not named. Whether EV charging belongs under item 9, or should be drafted by analogy to items 4 to 6, the regulation doesn’t say. If you draft an agreement, describe the service in the list’s own vocabulary, for example extra electricity supplied for charging a vehicle, and accept that the label alone won’t settle a dispute.

How much. Under s.16(2), the maximum increase is the landlord’s actual cost of what is being added. Where actual cost can’t be established, or there is no cost to the landlord, it is “a reasonable amount based on the value” of the thing.

What makes it fall apart. Section 124 voids a s.123 agreement entered into as a result of coercion, or of a “false, incomplete or misleading representation” by the landlord or the landlord’s agent. If a tenant signed after being told a monthly fee was legally required when it wasn’t, that is the kind of representation the section names.

Unwinding it. If both sides later agree the landlord will stop providing the service, s.125 says the landlord shall decrease the rent. Where the item was provided under an earlier s.123 agreement, s.16(5) sets the minimum decrease at the most recent separate charge for it.

Before you answer the tenant’s email

Grouped by who has to do what.