When the Condo Corporation, Not Your Landlord, Wants Into Your Rental Unit
Your lease is with the unit owner, yet the request to come in is from a management company you never signed with. Its authority comes from one sentence in Ontario’s Condominium Act. Here is that sentence, read one phrase at a time.
Does a condo corporation have its own right to enter a rented unit, and what notice does it owe?
Yes. Section 19 of Ontario’s Condominium Act, 1998 gives the corporation, or a person it authorizes, a right of entry that does not depend on your lease. The section requires three things: reasonable notice must be given, the entry must be at a reasonable time, and it must be for carrying out the corporation’s objects and duties or exercising its powers. It sets no number of hours, no clock window, no rule on who receives the notice, and no emergency exception. Those working details usually sit in the building’s own declaration, by-laws and rules.
Source: Government of Ontario, Condominium Act, 1998, S.O. 1998, c. 19, s. 19 (e-Laws consolidation current from December 31, 2025)
I’m Arthur Zhao, a broker with AZ Real Estate Partners. Picture the arrangement behind most condo rentals. Your lease is with one person: the unit owner. Rent goes to them, repair requests go to them, and your notice to move out will go to them. You have likely never met a member of the condo board or been inside the management office.
Then a request arrives from a property management company, a company you have no contract with, saying it needs to get into your unit. The obvious questions follow. Who are these people to me, and where does their authority come from?
That authority does not run through your lease at all. It comes from one sentence in Ontario’s Condominium Act, 1998: section 19. I’ll go through that sentence phrase by phrase, set it against the rules your landlord follows under the Residential Tenancies Act, and then cover what the Act lays out if the door stays closed. This is general information on how the rules read, not legal advice on your situation.
The whole rule is one sentence
Here is section 19 in full, under the heading “Right of entry”:
“On giving reasonable notice, the corporation or a person authorized by the corporation may enter a unit or a part of the common elements of which an owner has exclusive use at any reasonable time to perform the objects and duties of the corporation or to exercise the powers of the corporation.”
A condominium corporation is the legal entity created when the condo is registered. It is the body people usually mean when they say “the condo,” “the board” or “management.” Under s.27(1) of the Act, its board of directors manages its affairs. The sentence above is the corporation’s own entry right, and each phrase in it does a specific job.
“On giving reasonable notice”
The opening words make notice a condition of entry. Under s.19, the corporation does not get a right to walk in unannounced. Notice comes first.
What the phrase does not do is put a number on it. There is no minimum count of hours or days in s.19, and the section does not say the notice must be written or in a particular form. “Reasonable” is a standard measured against the circumstances, such as what the work is, how urgent it is, and how much time the people affected need to prepare. A request that comes with a little warning for a minor job and one that comes with a little warning for a major one can sit very differently against that standard.
“The corporation or a person authorized by the corporation”
The right belongs to the corporation, but it can act through others. In practice, the person at your door is usually not a board member. It may be the property manager, building staff, or a contractor the corporation has hired, such as a plumber or a fire-safety technician.
That explains the triangle in the intro. You have no contract with the management company, and you don’t need one. The company is there as a person the corporation has authorized, and it borrows the corporation’s s.19 right. If you are unsure whether someone is acting for the corporation, asking who authorized the visit and for what job is a fair question.
The phrase also tells you where the right reaches: the unit itself, and any part of the common elements of which an owner has exclusive use. In many buildings the declaration assigns a balcony to a unit that way, but which areas qualify depends on that building’s declaration.
“At any reasonable time”
This phrase governs timing, and once again it is a standard rather than a schedule. Section 19 does not name hours of the day, exclude weekends or set a window. Whether a time is reasonable depends on the same kind of facts as reasonable notice: the job, any urgency, and the effect on the people living there.
Read together, the first and third phrases give the corporation room to run building operations while giving the occupant two protections: they are told in advance, and the visit does not come at an unreasonable hour.
“To perform the objects and duties of the corporation or to exercise the powers of the corporation”
The last phrase ties the right to a purpose. Entry under s.19 has to connect to what the corporation is there to do. According to the Condominium Act, 1998 (s.17), the corporation’s objects are to manage the property and its assets on behalf of the owners. Its duties include controlling, managing and administering the common elements and assets, and taking all reasonable steps to ensure that owners and occupiers comply with the Act, the declaration, the by-laws and the rules. Elsewhere the Act gives the corporation repair and maintenance obligations (ss.89 and 90), subject to whatever the declaration changes under s.91.
Common situations behind an entry request include a building-wide fire safety inspection, servicing heating and cooling equipment, tracing a leak that shows up in the unit below, or pest treatment that has to reach every unit on a stack. These are typical examples. They are not a list written into the statute.
What the sentence never mentions
Just as important is what s.19 leaves out:
- Who gets the notice. The section says “on giving reasonable notice” without naming a recipient. It does not say whether notice goes to the owner, the occupier, or both.
- Form and method. Nothing about writing, posting, email or delivery.
- Specific hours. No number of hours ahead, and no window of the day.
- Emergencies. No exception for entering without notice.
These gaps are where a building’s own documents usually come in. Under s.83(1)(c) of the Act, an owner who leases a unit must, within 10 days of entering into the lease, give the tenant a copy of the declaration, by-laws and rules. If your lease is on Ontario’s Standard Form of Lease and the condominium box in section 2 is checked, you agreed in that section to comply with the condominium declaration, by-laws and rules, as provided by the landlord.
⚠️Entry without notice in an emergency is not in the text of s.19. The section contains no emergency exception. In fact, the only place the word “emergency” appears in the Condominium Act, 1998 is s.134(2.3), a provision about notice of certain court applications that is not yet in force. Whether management may come in unannounced for something like a burst pipe is commonly dealt with in a building’s own declaration, by-laws or rules. Check what yours says.
What the text settles, and what it leaves open
The landlord’s line, for contrast
Your landlord comes in under a different statute with much more detail. Under the Residential Tenancies Act, 2006, s.25, a landlord may enter a rental unit only in accordance with s.26 or s.27.
Section 26(1) allows entry without written notice in an emergency, or if the tenant consents at the time of entry. Section 27(1) allows entry on written notice given at least 24 hours ahead for five listed purposes: repairs or work in the unit; a view by a potential mortgagee or insurer; a physical inspection by an engineer, architect or other qualified person to satisfy a requirement under s.9(4) of the Condominium Act, 1998; a reasonable inspection of the state of repair; and any other reasonable reason specified in the tenancy agreement. Section 27(3) requires the notice to state the reason, the day, and a time between 8 a.m. and 8 p.m.
Put the two side by side and the difference in drafting is plain. The RTA’s definition of “landlord” in s.2(1) covers the owner, their successors, and anyone else entitled to possession who tries to enforce a landlord’s rights, and it does not name a condominium corporation. Section 3(4) of the RTA says the RTA prevails where it conflicts with another Act, other than the Human Rights Code. However, neither statute says in so many words whether a corporation entering under s.19 must also meet the RTA’s 24-hour rule. The text does not answer that question, and this article doesn’t either.
What is clear is the landlord’s own side. If your landlord passes on the corporation’s request or comes along for the visit, the landlord’s entry is still governed by RTA ss.25 to 27.
If the door stays closed
The Act’s enforcement path runs through the owner as much as the occupier. Under s.119(1), an occupier of a unit must comply with the Act, the declaration, the by-laws and the rules. Under s.119(2), the owner must take all reasonable steps to make sure the occupier complies. Under s.119(3), the corporation has the right to require compliance.
If that does not work, s.134(1) lets the corporation apply to the Superior Court of Justice for an order enforcing compliance. Where the mediation and arbitration process in s.132 is required, it must be used first (s.134(2)). Under s.132(4), that process is deemed to be part of every declaration for disagreements between the corporation and the owners. Note that the parties named there are the corporation and the owners, not tenants.
On an application, the court may grant the order, require the people named in it to pay the applicant’s damages and the costs of obtaining the order, or grant other relief that is fair and equitable (s.134(3)). Section 134(4) limits one remedy in particular. The court may not end a residential lease under that provision unless the tenant has breached an order already made under s.134(3), or has received a notice under s.87(1) and not paid the amount it requires.
For a real dispute over your own unit, these steps are a framework, not a forecast. Talk to a lawyer before you decide how to respond.
💡 My own view: in an access dispute, the landlord has the most at stake and can be the last to find out. Under s.134(5), if the corporation obtains damages or costs against an owner or an occupier, that amount, plus the corporation’s additional actual costs of getting the order, is added to the common expenses for the unit, and the corporation can set when the owner must pay. The bill lands on the unit owner first, no matter who kept the door closed. That gives your landlord the strongest reason to help sort out a scheduling problem quickly, so bring them in at the first request, and do it in writing.
Keeping access requests from turning into disputes
Grouped by the person you are dealing with:
- ☐Forward the corporation’s access request to your landlord in writing on the day it arrives.
- ☐Explain in writing if the proposed time does not work for you, and suggest one that does.
- ☐Ask whether your landlord plans to attend. If so, their own entry follows RTA ss.26 and 27.
- ☐Ask what the entry is for and what work will be done inside the unit.
- ☐Ask who will be coming in, whether building staff or a contractor the corporation has authorized.
- ☐Propose an alternative time in writing if the one offered is a genuine problem.
- ☐Keep every notice or message, along with the date you received it.
- ☐Record the date, time, names and work done on the day of entry.
- ☐Photograph the affected area before and after the work, where that is practical.
- Condominium Act, 1998, S.O. 1998, c. 19: ss. 17, 17.0.1, 19, 27, 83, 89 to 91, 119, 132, 134 (e-Laws consolidation current from December 31, 2025)
- Residential Tenancies Act, 2006, S.O. 2006, c. 17: ss. 2(1), 3(4), 25 to 27
- Ontario Standard Form of Lease (Residential Tenancy Agreement, form 2229E), section 2
Renting Out a Condo? You Owe One Duty an Ordinary Landlord Doesn’t: Section 83 of the Condominium Act →By-law Officer, Fire Inspector or MPAC Assessor at Your Door: When an Ontario Homeowner Can Say No Depends on What They’re Holding →Mould in an Ontario Rental: Landlord Repair Duty or Tenant-Caused Damage? →First-Time Renter Guide →
Frequently Asked Questions
If my landlord comes along with the property manager, does the 24-hour notice rule apply?
To your landlord’s entry, yes. Under the Residential Tenancies Act, 2006, ss.25 to 27, a landlord enters either without written notice in an emergency or with the tenant’s consent at the time, or on at least 24 hours’ written notice stating the reason, the day and a time between 8 a.m. and 8 p.m. Neither statute says expressly how that rule combines with the corporation’s separate right under s.19 of the Condominium Act, 1998, which requires reasonable notice.
Does the condo have to send the notice to me, or to my landlord?
Section 19 of the Condominium Act, 1998 does not say. It requires reasonable notice but names no recipient, so it does not settle whether the owner, the occupier or both must be told. A building’s declaration, by-laws or rules may set a delivery method. Either way, passing any notice on to your landlord in writing keeps everyone working from the same information.
Can I ask management to come at a different time, or to be home when they come in?
Section 19 requires the corporation to enter at a reasonable time after reasonable notice. It gives you no right to set the time or to be present, and it does not stop you from asking. A written request for a specific alternative time, sent to the manager with a copy to your landlord, leaves a clear record of what you offered.
Is the property manager the same thing as the condo corporation?
No. The corporation is the legal entity, and its board of directors manages its affairs (Condominium Act, 1998, s.27(1)). A management company is a provider the corporation contracts with, and s.17.0.1 requires that provider or manager to be licensed under the Condominium Management Services Act, 2015. When the manager enters a unit, it does so as a person authorized by the corporation under s.19.
What kind of work counts as the corporation’s “objects and duties”?
Under s.17 of the Condominium Act, 1998, the corporation’s objects are to manage the property and assets on behalf of the owners, and its duties include managing the common elements and taking reasonable steps to ensure compliance with the Act, declaration, by-laws and rules. Sections 89 and 90 add repair and maintenance obligations, which the declaration can modify under s.91. In practice, fire safety inspections, servicing heating and cooling equipment, tracing a leak and pest treatment are common examples, but the Act contains no checklist of permitted reasons.
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