What is a status certificate in Ontario, and what does it include?

A status certificate is the condo corporation's official financial and legal health record, and your single most important document before buying a condo. The corporation must deliver it within 10 days of your request and payment, and the certificate fee is capped at $100 including taxes, a figure frozen since 2001. In practice, most Toronto and GTA management companies deliver it through an online portal that adds a separate convenience fee of roughly $30 to $50 plus HST, so the real all-in cost is usually about $150; you can often avoid that fee by requesting the certificate directly from management, and a rush copy is not capped and can add a few hundred dollars. It must disclose the unit's monthly common expenses and any arrears, the corporation's budget and reserve fund balance, the most recent reserve fund study, any special assessments or fee increases the board has declared or knows are coming, outstanding judgments and ongoing litigation, the declaration, by-laws and rules (including rental and pet restrictions), and the corporation's insurance and its deductible. Your lawyer reviews it before you firm up the offer, which is why you keep a status-certificate review condition on a condo offer.

What is a reserve fund and why does it matter?

A reserve fund is the savings account a condo corporation maintains to pay for major repairs: roof replacement, garage waterproofing, elevator modernization, facade work. When the fund is underfunded, the corporation passes the shortfall directly to owners as a special assessment. A healthy reserve fund is one of the strongest signals that the building will not surprise you with a five-figure invoice three years after you move in.

How recent should a reserve fund study be?

Ontario's Condominium Act requires every condo corporation to complete a reserve fund study in its first year and then update it at least every three years. Read the most recent one in full. If the corporation is near the end of that three-year window, the numbers are already dated: construction costs in Canada have been rising roughly three to four percent a year, so a study from 2023 can understate today's repair costs by ten percent or more.

What's a special assessment, and how do I find out if one is coming?

A special assessment is a one-time charge levied on owners when the reserve fund cannot cover a needed expense. The status certificate must disclose any special assessments charged since the current budget, plus anything the corporation already knows that could push your common expenses up. The corporation has 10 days to deliver the certificate once you request it; review it before firming up your offer. Read the board meeting minutes for the previous twelve months as well. Boards often discuss looming repairs months before a formal assessment is voted on.

For buyers · Advisory

Anatomy of a Safe Condo: Five Things to Investigate Before You Make an Offer

The boring numbers that decide whether the unit you fall in love with becomes the trap you spent the next decade trying to escape.

8 min read

Jasmina Zivkovic

REALTOR®, RE/MAX Your Community Realty Inc.

In the GTA’s 2026 buyer’s market, the temptation is to focus on price. You think you have leverage. You do, but not the leverage you think. The real leverage is time, and the patience to investigate before you write the offer.

Every week, I walk first-time buyers through condos that look great on the listing photos and feel right when you tour them. Beautiful kitchens. Generous closet space. A balcony that catches the morning sun. The emotional answer arrives in the first three minutes, and then it takes me another two hours to surface what the building isn’t telling you.

Two units can look identical on the tour while the building wrapped around them is a sound home in one case and an expensive problem in the other: its repairs, its finances, the way it is run. Telling those two buildings apart, before you fall for the unit, is what this list is for. You can use it before you call anyone, including me. It is the condo half of a bigger question I have written about before: how to avoid buying the wrong home.

First, the one document that holds most of the answers: the status certificate

Before the five things below, know where you find them. In Ontario, the status certificate is the condo corporation’s official financial and legal health record, and your single most important read before you buy. You request it, the corporation must deliver it within 10 days, and the certificate fee is capped at $100 including taxes, a number frozen since 2001. One wrinkle worth knowing: in practice most Toronto and GTA management companies now deliver the certificate through an online portal that adds a separate “convenience fee” of about $30 to $50 plus HST, charged as an optional digital-delivery service rather than part of the capped certificate fee, so the real all-in cost is usually around $150. You can often avoid that surcharge by requesting the certificate directly from management the traditional way, and if you need it fast, a rush copy falls outside the $100 cap and can add a few hundred dollars more. Even at around $150, for what it contains, it is the best money you will spend in the entire purchase.

A status certificate must disclose, among other things:

The unit’s monthly common expenses, and whether the current owner is in arrears.
The corporation’s budget and financial statements.
The reserve fund balance and the most recent reserve fund study.
Any special assessments levied, and any increase in common expenses the board has declared or already knows is coming.
Outstanding judgments and ongoing litigation against the corporation.
The declaration, by-laws, and rules, including any rental or pet restrictions.
The corporation’s insurance, including its deductible (which matters more than buyers expect; see below).

Your lawyer reviews the status certificate as part of the closing work they do for you, which is exactly why you keep a status-certificate review condition on a condo offer. The five things below are how you read what the certificate, the reserve fund study, and the board minutes are actually telling you.

1. The reserve fund balance, relative to the building’s age and size

The number on the reserve fund’s first page is the easy part. The harder part is whether that number is appropriate for this building.

A 200-unit, 25-year-old highrise with a $1.2 million reserve fund is almost certainly underfunded. A 60-unit, 10-year-old midrise with the same $1.2 million is probably fine. Under Ontario’s Condominium Act, the corporation must update its reserve fund study at least every three years, and the study must recommend a funding plan projected over at least the next 30 years. Read the recommended contribution schedule and compare it to what the corporation is actually contributing. If the corporation has been under-contributing for three or more years to keep monthly fees attractive on listings, you are looking at a building that is borrowing against your future.

Check the study’s date, too. Construction costs in Canada have been rising roughly three to four percent a year, so a study near the end of its three-year cycle is pricing tomorrow’s repairs in yesterday’s dollars.

2. The age and condition of three specific systems

Most condo crises trace back to one of three systems.

The roof. A flat membrane roof typically lasts 20 to 25 years, sometimes less depending on the membrane and how well it has been maintained. If the building is approaching that window and the reserve fund study doesn’t show a planned replacement in the next five years, ask the property manager when it was last replaced. Get a written answer.
The parking garage waterproofing. Underground parking structures fail in expensive ways. Water infiltration corrodes rebar, which causes concrete spalling, which can require a slab repair that runs into the millions on a large structure. Walk the parking levels yourself. White stalactites on concrete columns are not decorative; they are the building telling you something.
The elevators. Modernization is a six-figure project per elevator: one Richmond Hill elevator contractor put the range at $110,000 to over $160,000 per cab back in 2017, and prices have only moved up since. A full replacement costs more still. The exact number varies by building, so treat any single figure as a starting point and get current quotes. If the building has three or four elevators and none have been modernized in the last 15 years, the bill is likely in your future.

3. The minutes of the last 12 months of board meetings

The status certificate is required to disclose certain things, but board meeting minutes disclose temperament: how the board is thinking about money, what residents have been complaining about, which contractors are doing repeat work. As a purchaser, you have the right to request the corporation’s records, and the minutes from the last 12 months are core records the corporation must hand over within seven days. Electronic copies are free; a paper copy can carry a small per-page fee. In other words, the building cannot hide its minutes from you, so ask.

What I scan for, in order:

Any mention of “special assessment” or “interim fee increase”, even as a discussion, not yet a vote.
Recurring complaints about a specific system (water leaks, elevator outages, garage flooding); these are often months ahead of a formal repair budget.
Litigation. Minutes often discuss legal action by or against the corporation before it shows up anywhere else, and the topic of those actions tells you a lot about how the building is being run.

4. Litigation history (separate from minutes)

A status certificate in Ontario must disclose any outstanding judgments against the corporation and any ongoing litigation it is involved in. This is one of the most valuable things it reveals. A long history of litigation, especially against the developer for construction defects, tells you the building has structural surprises in its DNA. A single lawsuit isn’t disqualifying; pattern matters. Three or more separate matters in the last decade is a yellow flag worth talking through.

5. The “feel” of the lobby and corridors at 8 PM on a Tuesday

This one isn’t on any inspection checklist, but it’s where I send buyers before they firm up an offer.

Visit the building at a time the listing agent won’t schedule for you. Eight in the evening, weekday. Walk the corridor your unit is on. Listen at the doors. Look at the elevator’s interior finishes. Are they scuffed in a way that suggests deferred maintenance, or just honest wear? Is the lobby clean and well-lit? Is the concierge present, attentive, or absent? Is there a smell of marijuana, or cooking, or nothing in particular?

What you’re looking for is not perfection. You’re looking for whether the building is what the listing says it is at the hour when nobody is staging it for you. A well-run building feels run. A neglected one feels like a building waiting for its first big problem.

The two traps the listing photos never show: the insurance deductible and the rules

Two of the items on that status-certificate list deserve far more than a glance, because buyers routinely skim past them and both can cost you real money after you own.

The insurance deductible. The corporation insures the building and common elements, but its policy carries a deductible, and on many GTA buildings that deductible is large, often tens of thousands of dollars. Here is the part that surprises owners: under section 105 of the Condominium Act, if a loss originates from your unit through an act or omission, a burst dishwasher hose, an overflowing toilet, a left-running tap, the corporation can add the lesser of the repair cost or its deductible to your common expenses, and this does not require a finding that you were negligent; it is enough that the loss arose from an act or omission in your unit. The status certificate discloses the corporation’s deductible. Read it, then carry your own unit-owner insurance with enough coverage for that deductible plus your contents and any improvements. It is the cheapest protection against the most common five-figure surprise in condo ownership.

The rules and the rental restrictions. The declaration, by-laws, and rules, all part of the status certificate package, govern how you can actually live in the unit: whether you can rent it out at all, whether short-term rentals like Airbnb are banned, pet size and number limits, what you may renovate, even balcony and barbecue rules. If your plan is to rent the unit, or you have a large dog, or you pictured summer evenings grilling on the balcony, read these before you fall in love. A rule you cannot live with is as much a dealbreaker as a thin reserve fund, and far easier to miss.

What I do for clients in this stage

When a buyer brings me a unit they’re seriously considering, here is the quiet work I do in the 48 hours before we firm up an offer. I pull the documents that decide it, and hand them to your lawyer to review: the status certificate, the most recent reserve fund study, and the last 12 months of board minutes. I read them for the patterns above, flag what is worth a closer look, and tell you exactly what to ask your lawyer before you commit; the reserve fund and litigation questions get answered in that review, not in mine. And I make sure you make that off-hours visit yourself, the fifth check above. It is the same instinct behind my guide to real estate fraud in the GTA: the paper tells you what the tour will not.

Then I bring you a short brief, one page, that summarizes the five questions above with my read on each. Sometimes the brief ends with “this is a good building.” More often it ends with one of two things: “this is a good building, here are two questions to ask before you sign,” or “this is the wrong building, here’s why.”

I would rather lose a commission than let you buy the wrong condo. That is not a slogan. It is the only way the work makes sense.

Frequently asked questions

What is a status certificate in Ontario, and what does it include?: A status certificate is the condo corporation's official financial and legal health record, and your single most important document before buying a condo. The corporation must deliver it within 10 days of your request and payment, and the certificate fee is capped at $100 including taxes, a figure frozen since 2001. In practice, most Toronto and GTA management companies deliver it through an online portal that adds a separate convenience fee of roughly $30 to $50 plus HST, so the real all-in cost is usually about $150; you can often avoid that fee by requesting the certificate directly from management, and a rush copy is not capped and can add a few hundred dollars. It must disclose the unit's monthly common expenses and any arrears, the corporation's budget and reserve fund balance, the most recent reserve fund study, any special assessments or fee increases the board has declared or knows are coming, outstanding judgments and ongoing litigation, the declaration, by-laws and rules (including rental and pet restrictions), and the corporation's insurance and its deductible. Your lawyer reviews it before you firm up the offer, which is why you keep a status-certificate review condition on a condo offer.
Can my condo corporation charge me its insurance deductible?: Yes, and it surprises many owners. Under section 105 of Ontario's Condominium Act, if a loss originates from your unit through an act or omission, such as a burst dishwasher hose or an overflowing toilet, the corporation can add the lesser of the repair cost or its insurance deductible to your common expenses, and this does not require a finding that you were negligent; it is enough that the loss arose from an act or omission in your unit. On many GTA buildings that deductible runs into the tens of thousands of dollars. The status certificate discloses the corporation's deductible, so read it, and carry your own unit-owner insurance with enough coverage for that deductible plus your contents and improvements.
What is a reserve fund and why does it matter?: A reserve fund is the savings account a condo corporation maintains to pay for major repairs: roof replacement, garage waterproofing, elevator modernization, facade work. When the fund is underfunded, the corporation passes the shortfall directly to owners as a special assessment. A healthy reserve fund is one of the strongest signals that the building will not surprise you with a five-figure invoice three years after you move in.
How recent should a reserve fund study be?: Ontario's Condominium Act requires every condo corporation to complete a reserve fund study in its first year and then update it at least every three years. Read the most recent one in full. If the corporation is near the end of that three-year window, the numbers are already dated: construction costs in Canada have been rising roughly three to four percent a year, so a study from 2023 can understate today's repair costs by ten percent or more.
What's a special assessment, and how do I find out if one is coming?: A special assessment is a one-time charge levied on owners when the reserve fund cannot cover a needed expense. The status certificate must disclose any special assessments charged since the current budget, plus anything the corporation already knows that could push your common expenses up. The corporation has 10 days to deliver the certificate once you request it; review it before firming up your offer. Read the board meeting minutes for the previous twelve months as well. Boards often discuss looming repairs months before a formal assessment is voted on.