Selling a Renovated Condo: What the Status Certificate Tells the Buyer’s Lawyer

Old renovation invoices meet a pre-listing questionnaire. Here is how a buyer’s lawyer reads the status certificate, line by line, and where your past changes show up.

I’m Arthur Zhao. Here is a scene I use to explain this topic. Before your condo goes on the market, your agent sends a pre-listing questionnaire. Most of it is easy: parking spot number, locker, appliances included. Then one line stops you: “Any alterations to common elements?”

You pull out the folder from the renovation you did twelve years ago. Hardwood laid through the whole suite. A wall opened between the kitchen and the living room. A wood deck built over the concrete on the terrace. The invoices are all there. What is not there is any sense of which of those three, if any, touched something you do not actually own.

That question matters because the buyer’s lawyer will not ask it the way the questionnaire does. They will read the corporation’s status certificate, and the answer comes out of specific items in that document. So instead of starting from your renovation, I will start from the certificate and walk through it in the order that matters for past alterations.

Item (f): the declaration and rules decide which changes were yours to make

Section 76(1) of the Condominium Act, 1998 lists what a status certificate must contain. I will refer to items by those clause letters; the certificate form itself is specified by the condominium authority and approved by the Minister (O. Reg. 48/01 s.18(2)), so the page layout may not follow the same letters.

Clause (f) is a copy of the current declaration, by-laws and rules. For a seller with old renovations, this is the boundary map. Under s.1, a unit is the part of the property designated as a unit by the description, and the common elements are everything else. The description specifies each unit’s boundaries (s.8(1)(c)), and the declaration must list every part of the common elements set aside for the use of particular units, such as a terrace or balcony (s.7(2)(f)). That is why the same physical feature can land on either side of the line from one building to the next. Whether the wall you opened was inside your unit or part of the common elements depends on where your corporation’s description draws the boundary, not on the fact that it sat inside your suite.

Changes that stayed within the unit are not s.98 matters. They are judged against the declaration, which may restrict how units are used (s.7(4)(b)), and the rules, which the board may make about the use of units and common elements as long as they are reasonable and consistent with the Act, the declaration and the by-laws (s.58(1) and (2)). Every owner must comply with all of these (s.119(1)). Flooring is the common example: many buildings have something to say about it, but what they say varies, so the only answer that counts is in your own corporation’s documents.

One side point for in-unit work: the corporation’s obligation to insure the units does not include insurance for damage to improvements made to a unit (s.99(4)). A buyer who inherits your hardwood should know that.

Item (j): the list of agreements between the corporation and this unit’s owner

Clause (j) requires a list of all current agreements between the corporation and the owner of the unit, alongside other agreements the corporation has with other corporations and under ss.111 to 113. For a seller this list is the first place a past alteration either appears or does not.

The certificate also has to state that the person who requested it has rights to look at those agreements (s.76(1)(k)). On a written request and reasonable notice, the corporation must let that person, or their authorized agent, examine the agreements, and must provide copies on request for a reasonable fee (s.76(7) and (8)).

If you know you signed something with the corporation when you renovated, this is where your buyer’s lawyer expects to find it named. If the list is empty, that is a statement too, and it should line up with what you put on the questionnaire.

Item (l): the s.98 compliance statement and the agreements attached to it

Clause (l) requires “a statement whether the parties have complied with all current agreements mentioned in clause 98 (1) (b) with respect to the unit.” The regulation adds that the certificate must include a copy of every such agreement that binds the unit (O. Reg. 48/01 s.18(1)(k)). To read that line properly, you need to know what an s.98 agreement is.

According to the Condominium Act, 1998 (s.98(1)), an owner may make an addition, alteration or improvement to the common elements that is not contrary to the Act or the declaration only if:

• the board has approved it by resolution;
• the owner and the corporation have entered into an agreement that allocates the cost, sets out who is responsible for repair after damage, maintenance and insurance, and covers anything else the regulations require;
• the notice requirements of s.97 are met, and a copy of the agreement goes out with the corporation’s notice to owners.

For work on common elements that the owner has exclusive use of, such as a terrace, s.98(2) drops the notice requirements if the board is satisfied on evidence that the change will not harm other units, will not cost the corporation anything, will not detract from the building’s appearance, will not affect structural integrity (with an engineer’s certificate where the structure is changed), and will not contravene the declaration or prescribed requirements. The regulation adds that the board must also be satisfied it will not contravene the by-laws or rules or harm the rest of the common elements, and the agreement must state who owns the change (O. Reg. 48/01 s.25).

Two subsections decide what your buyer inherits. Under s.98(3), the agreement does not take effect until the conditions are met and the corporation has registered it against the title to your unit. Under s.98(5), the agreement binds the unit and is enforceable against the owner’s successors and assigns. In plain terms: a properly completed agreement travels with the unit to the buyer, and because it is on title, the buyer’s lawyer can find it in a title search as well as in the certificate.

A change to exclusive-use common elements: with an agreement on title vs. without one

Item (q): amounts the Act adds to this unit’s common expenses

Clause (q) requires a statement of the amounts, if any, that the Act requires be added to the common expenses payable for the unit. Two routes in the Act lead here for past alterations.

The first is s.98(4). If an owner fails to comply with a s.98 agreement, the corporation may add the resulting costs, charges, interest and expenses to the unit’s common expenses and set a time for payment.

The second is s.92. It is narrower than many people assume. It is not a general power to undo unapproved changes. It covers three situations: the declaration makes the owner responsible for repair after damage and the owner does not do it in a reasonable time (the corporation shall do the work); the declaration makes the owner responsible for maintaining certain common elements and the owner does not (the corporation may do it); or the owner fails to maintain the unit and that creates a risk of damage or injury (the corporation may do it). In each case the owner is deemed to have consented and the cost is added to the unit’s common expenses (s.92(4)).

Separately, the regulation requires the certificate to state what the corporation knows, if anything, about circumstances that may increase the common expenses for the unit (O. Reg. 48/01 s.18(1)(f)). A known dispute about your terrace deck could surface here even before any money has been charged.

Reg s.18(1)(c): whether a certificate of lien is registered against the unit

The regulation requires a statement of whether any certificate of lien has been registered against the unit under s.85 (O. Reg. 48/01 s.18(1)(c)). This is where unpaid charges from the previous section end up.

If an owner defaults on common expenses, the corporation has a lien against the unit for the unpaid amount, plus interest and reasonable legal costs and collection expenses (s.85(1)). The lien expires three months after the default unless the corporation registers a certificate of lien within that time (s.85(2)), and it must give the owner written notice at least 10 days before registering (s.85(4)). Once registered, the lien can be enforced in the same manner as a mortgage (s.85(6)).

So the path from an old alteration to a title problem is a real one: an amount added under s.92(4) or s.98(4) is a common expense, and an unpaid common expense can become a registered lien.

Section 76(3) to (6): timing, gaps, and who the certificate binds

Four subsections decide how much weight the document carries.

• Timing (s.76(3)): the corporation must give the certificate within 10 days after receiving the request and payment of the fee.
• Gaps (s.76(4)): if the certificate omits material information it is required to contain, it is deemed to include a statement that there is no such information.
• Late certificates (s.76(5)): if the corporation misses the deadline, it is deemed to have issued a certificate the day after, stating three things only: no default in common expenses, no increase in common expenses declared since the budget, and no reserve fund assessment levied since the budget.
• Effect (s.76(6)): the certificate binds the corporation, as of its date, with respect to the information it contains or is deemed to contain, as against a purchaser or mortgagee who relies on it.

Notice what s.76(5) does not cover. A late certificate is deemed to say nothing about s.98 agreements, alterations or liens. And s.76(6) describes the corporation’s position against a relying buyer. It says nothing about the seller.

If there is a disagreement: the route before any courtroom

Sellers who find a gap late sometimes assume the question is whether the corporation will sue. The Act sets a different order.

Every s.98 agreement is deemed to contain a provision sending disagreements about it to mediation, and then, if mediation does not settle it, to arbitration under the Arbitration Act, 1991 (s.132(1) and (2), item 3). Disagreements between the corporation and owners about the declaration, by-laws or rules are sent to the same process (s.132(4)). Under s.134(2), a person cannot apply to court for a compliance order where those processes are required until they have failed to obtain compliance through them.

There is one more filter. Neither s.132(1) and (4) nor s.134 applies to a matter in dispute that can be brought to the Condominium Authority Tribunal (s.132(4.1); s.134(2.4)). Whether a particular dispute falls within the Tribunal’s jurisdiction is a question to check against the current rules for that Tribunal, not something to assume.

For a seller, the practical point is timing. Mediation and arbitration take longer than a typical conditional period, which is one more reason to know what the certificate will say before a buyer does.

Every corporation’s declaration, rules and agreements are different, and this article is general information rather than legal advice. Before you list, have a real estate lawyer look at your documents and your specific changes.

Before you list: gather the paper, by who holds it

Each group below is organized by where the document lives, because that decides how long it takes to get.