Living in a condominium means living with rules, some of which you may abide by, some of which you might loathe, and some you think are unique to your stupid, annoying, awful building.
Over the years, both living in condos and selling to clients, I’ve come to learn which rules irk people the most, as well as which are common and which are not.
Let me provide some context on the top ten rules condo-owners disagree with, which of course, some of you might argue serve a purpose…
Honestly folks, I feel like I’ve already written this blog.
Ten years, 2,000+ blog posts, and while I know I’ve covered “condo rules” many times, part of me thinks I may have touched on this subject before.
We’ve talked a lot in the past about condo rules.
I wrote a blog in 2014 called, “Five Rules That Residents Of Your Condo Are Breaking.”
In 2009, I wrote, “Ignore The Rules,” again, about broken rules.
And on a related topics, in 2015 I wrote, “Top Ten Subtle Annoyances For First-Time Condo Owners.” That was a doozie!
So while we’ve covered the ideas below before in passing, today I want to dedicate an entire post to the rules that most residents disagree with, and those that do agree with them, really think they’re necessary.
I welcome your feedback on all of these, and whether you agree or disagree, and of course, why.
10) Closing the outdoor common elements for the season.
It seems reasonable, at least to most people.
I had a client once who disagreed, and took this issue as far as he could take it.
He told me, “I’d love to be able to enjoy a fine Cuban cigar outside, on the rooftop terrace, staring at the CN Tower and city lights. But the goddam condo insists on closing the terrace from November to March.”
He wrote letters, he solicited legal opinions, all the while, basically being the only person in the building who wanted to use the rooftop terrace, in -15 degree weather.
Sometimes, the squeaky wheel gets the grease.
But sometimes, the fact that one person out of 200-some-odd residents is complaining about a rule, simply reinforces the appropriateness of that rule.
If you’ve served on a board of directors, you know that the common elements are closed because of insurance reasons.
There’s not as much maintenance, and virtually no “risk” attributed to the elements, in spring and summer. But come winter, management would have to salt every square inch of the rooftop terrace or other common areas, not to mention mop the hallways and stairs leading to and from the common areas, as drunk party-goers aren’t going to clean up after themselves.
Add in the higher insurance premiums associated with an outdoor space, in the winter, with high foot traffic, and just about every condominium in Toronto closes their terrace for the winter.
But as I alluded to above, there will always be people who disagree.
9) Maximum visitor parking passes issued for each unit, per month.
I know I’ve told this story before. I just can’t find the blog…
At our condo AGM a couple of years ago, a resident stood up and said, “What’s with the maximum monthly visitor parking passes? My girlfriend lives with me, and I’m only allowed seven passes per month? What the hell is this?”
Agree or disagree with the rule about a maximum number of monthly visitor parking passes, but you can’t deny that the quote above illustrates exactly why the measure is put in place.
In the case above, if the girlfriend lives in the building, and wants to park her car there every night, then she should rent a parking space.
Visitor parking is for visitors, and the potential for abuse is massive.
8) Concierge cannot open door for residents.
This is a new one, eh?
Imagine coming home and carrying a dozen grocery bags, with your shoulders aching, fingers about to fall off, and smiling at the concierge – who you see every day, looking for he or she to open the door.
Then imagine the concierge – Jake, or Cathy, or whoever you see, day-in, day-out, shaking their head to say “no.”
This is how some buildings in Toronto operate.
Every resident must use their key-FOB to access the building, regardless of day, time, circumstance, or being “known” to the concierge.
It’s an across-the-board, no-room-for-grey-area approach that some management companies and/or board of directors’ have implemented to avoid the concierge having to make a decision on who they know, who they don’t, and who they might.
7) Cannot walk pets through front lobby.
A family member of mine lives in a building with this rule.
You cannot, at any time, under any circumstances, walk your pet through the front lobby.
You can however, walk your dog (or cat, or bird…) through the back lobby.
You can also, amazingly, carry your pet through the front lobby.
The rules basically boil down to the feet touching the tile.
You’re not allowed to “walk” your pet through the front lobby, but you can “bring” them through, so long as they’re being carried.
If you’ve got an 8-pound Maltese, you’re good.
If you have an 80-pound Rottweiler, you’d better have been working those biceps at the gym…
6) No storage on terraces.
This is an interesting one, since it can take many shapes and forms.
Some condominiums specifically outlaw storage units, and I’m not sure why.
A client of mine bought a condo with a large storage shed – the kind you see sitting in the parking lot on display at Home Depot, and the unit was used by the previous owners for as long as they had lived there.
Upon moving in, and using the storage shed, he received a note from his property manager saying that storage units weren’t permitted on terraces, balconies, or any exclusive-use common elements.
To make matters worse, when he refused to remove it, they fined him, and debited his bank account!
A storage shed is one thing, but some condos don’t allow any storage, ie. bicycles, winter tires, or whatever else you might store for a day, or a winter.
There’s a level of subjectivity to this too, so you don’t really know what management will have a problem with, often, until they make it your problem…
5) Gym is closed for cleaning at set times, daily.
Most condominiums with gyms have a time, every day, where the gym is closed for cleaning.
This makes sense, right?
You want a clean gym, and you want to enjoy the space.
You’re happy that the property manager is making this a priority, and rather pleased with the overall condition of the facility whenever you use it.
However, that doesn’t mean that when you see the gym is closed every day from 12pm to 1pm, that you’re going to abide by the rules.
Every man, woman, and child in the condo suffers from the same hypocritical contradiction: they want the gym cleaned, but not when they want to use it.
Let’s be honest: you don’t need to shut down the entire gym, when you need to clean it.
If you’re the cleaner, and you’re wiping down the dry sweat on the stairmaster, why can’t a guy be doing squats 200 feet away?
If you’re on the treadmill running a 5K, does it bother you that somebody is cleaning the adjacent yoga room?
This is one of those rules that just about nobody abides by, for what it’s worth…
4) Certified funds required to book moving elevator.
When you go to book the moving elevator in your building, for moving in, moving out, or for a delivery, you almost always have to provide a deposit cheque.
This makes sense, right?
No objections here.
Any time you’re turning a couch up on its side, and trying to ensure it doesn’t slam against the glass walls that surround the inside of the elevator, I think it’s fair to say you risk causing damage.
I don’t know many people who would object to the “deposit cheque necessary to book moving elevator” rule.
But what about when the deposit cheque has to be certified?
That takes things to a whole new level.
For one thing, the amount is arbitrary, and differs significantly from one building to the next.
In my building, it was $75.00 for five years, until all of a sudden, it increased to a whopping $500.
So what if a resident needed that $500 in certified funds?
First of all, it means the resident can no long say, “Oh shoot, I have a fridge coming from tomorrow, I’d better go down and book the elevator.” Now they have to plan in advance to get to the bank, stand in line, dole out $8.00 for a bank draft, and do so before the elevator is reserved.
But isn’t $500 a lot to some people?
Aren’t there a lot of people in Toronto living month-to-month, especially those who rent, and complain that prices and rents are too high?
Maybe you’re only taking that $500 from your bank account for two or three days, but I think for some people, that’s a huge ask.
So what are the pros and cons of this approach?
Well personally, every time I write a cheque to book the moving elevator in my building, I do so on an account that has been cancelled for three years. Not because I’m trying to stiff the condominium corporation in the event that I damage the elevator, but because that’s the cheque book that happens to be in our hall table.
So using my own situation as an example of where things can go wrong for the condominium corporation, are they within their right to ask for certified funds, or is this being over the top?
3) Must book a security guard for any usage of the party room.
Note the word “any.”
As in, if you want to use the space to play Warhammer with your old high school buddy.
As in, if you want to use the room for eight minutes, with one person, you need to book a security guard.
Oh – and perhaps we should add “Three Hour Minimum” to this rule, just for fun.
So imagine being a parent who lives in a condo with two kids, wants to use the party room for them to run around for ten minutes, and being expected to book a security guard for $28.60 per hour, for three hours.
This is how a lot of condominiums in Toronto function, and residents hate it.
Living on the floor that’s down the hall from the party room, I can tell you that I believe all parties with 20, 30, or 40 people should have a security guard standing in the hall to ensure that drunk morons don’t engage in a “who can shout louder” contest at 12:30am.
But where do you draw the line? Do you say, “More than ten persons requires a security guard?” Then how do you enforce that? What if the person booking the party room says there will be eight people, but another dozen show up?
This is why the rules is often so hard-and-fast.
It goes back to the “no grey area” school of thinking with the concierges not buzzing anybody into the building.
You want to use the party room? Book a security guard. For one hour, or the whole night. For your two kids, or your 40 friends from work.
Not every condominium has this rule, but many do.
2) Concierge does not accept or hold keys.
This is it, folks.
This is the rule that irks the most condo owners, and is the most disagreed-with in the city.
But it’s not the most controversial, and most talked about, and thus why it sits at #2, and not #1. And I think you’ll see in a moment why #1 is #1…
Of course, if you’re on a board of directors in your building, and you had a hand in bringing this rule about concierges not holding keys to your building, then I’m sure you’ll post your displeasure below.
But at the risk of not remaining unbiased, let me say that I wholeheartedly disagree with this rule, for the same reason we’ve discussed over and over: a concierge is supposed to help. The word “concierge” comes from a French root word, meaning “help.” Or you might say it comes from the Latin “conservus” which means “fellow slave,” but either way, I believe a concierge is supposed to help residents.
Holding keys – for the dog-walker, the cleaning lady, or your mother, comes with risk and liability. I understand that.
But unlike closing the terrace in the winter, I don’t think that refusing to hold keys for residents is reasonable, given that every resident, at some point, will want a key held.
Toronto’s downtown core is full of dog-owners, and they all have dog-walkers. The city is also full of lazy and/or busy people who need cleaning services. There are countless other reasons as to why you might need a key held at concierge, and this further illustrates just how important it is that a building does allow front desk, concierge, security, and the like, to hold keys.
1) No short-term rentals.
Two years ago, I don’t know that we’d even be talking about this.
And while I don’t want to think that my building is being used as a youth hostel to people who plan to stay in the unit for one night, and couldn’t possibly care less how they leave the unit or treat the building, there are a LOT of downtown Toronto residents who want to lease their unit by the night.
This point could be an entire blog post, so at the risk of being too brief, I think enough has already been said.
But there isn’t a “rule” in Toronto condos today that’s under more scrutiny than the Anti-AirBnB rule being referred to as “no short-term rentals.”
And I’d love to know your completely biased thoughts on this. Let me know if you’d prefer to live in a building where AirBnb is allowed.
lui
at 7:52 am
The pet thru the lobby rule is as dumb as the bike thru the lobby rule.If the pet or bike is not caked in mud or dripping with water way not allow them access thru the front lobby?.
Max
at 5:30 pm
It’s not about dirt it’s about safety. If you had a young child would you not want to worry about dogs that might attack your ball-holding child?
Ruby
at 10:20 pm
I don’t think a person with a service dog should be discriminated against by disallowing them from walking their service dog through the front lobby.
A Grant
at 7:54 am
I agree with a rule that forces pet owners to ensure that their pets are on a leash and under their control at all times. No pets through a lobby? That’s crazy talk
Marina
at 10:35 am
Service dogs are usually excluded from these rules – municipal bylaws exempt them.
Just like restaurants can ban pets, but not service dogs.
TB
at 1:33 pm
I’m a guide dog user, service dogs under federal and provincial alw are by legal definition not pets so are exempt from all rules regarding pets, they can walk through any area, weight and size restrictions don’t applye tc.
Darcy
at 11:47 pm
The problem is that they often ARE caked with mud. As its difficult to enforce you can do something but only if clean the solution is to not allow it at all. think about several animals being taken out several times a day on a rainy or muddy days. Do the owners want to pay a fulltime cleaning staff to mop up after every bike or pet all day/night long? Do other owners want to come home to a dirty muddy building? Even if it was recently cleaned but 1 bike and 2 dogs just came through the last 30 minutes? Do people actually stop and clean their pets feet or their bike before entering? No! often this was allowed and because people did not follow that they have to wipe the mud off first is what then made it so this rule needed to be implemented. All rules come from a history of an ongoing problem. And are created to correct the problem!
A Grant
at 10:22 am
No bikes in condo/elevator rule – broke that one all the time. Our previous condo had a bike cage in the parking garage, which was full (often with bikes that never appeared to see the light of day). Got into several arguments with the property manager about this. I suggested solutions – expanding the bike cage; installing a bike rack on the wall of each parking spot; having each person request a tag, for a minimum fee, to allow them to park in the bike cage (so we could identify and remove orphan bikes). Nothing.
Well, I wasn’t about to leave my main form of transportation locked outside everyday, so in my condo it went.
Mark
at 7:38 pm
Same here. No bikes in the lobby or elevator. Our elevator is really small, so that one might be reasonable, and I live low enough I can carry the bike up. But I have to go through the lobby, and I won’t leave the bike outside.
After close to a year and multiple complaints to management, finally got assigned a place in the bike room, so I don’t do that anymore. Plenty of other bikes in the bike room have expired tags and many of them obviously don’t see daily use, so I’m guessing the management doesn’t really want to deal with abandoned bikes.
m m
at 11:40 am
I think you addressed #2 before, but this is directly related to #1. People are still inclined to rent their unit on airbnb even if the rules say otherwise. It’s easy to use the concierge to hand over the keys to the next visitor, rather than having to be there.
Francesca
at 12:29 pm
I personally wouldn’t like to live in a building where AirBnb rentals are allowed. I would worry about noise, safety and wear and tear on common elements. Furthermore it takes away any possible community feel of getting to know your neighbours if several units are treated more like hotel rooms than actual homes. In fact the increase in short term rentals predominant in certain condos and locations of the city are one of the main reasons I may never move back into a condo in the future. I would pay extra to live in a building that banned short term rentals or in an area less likely to attract tourists. I know it may be hard. to enforce this rule. The board and condo owners would have to patrol things closely to monitor whether there are tenants or owners breaking this rule. There was just an article the other day of a condo building in downtown Montreal where all units except for one were being rented on AirBnb. The owner wasn’t too happy about this. Here is the link http://www.cbc.ca/news/canada/montreal/airbnb-folo-plateau-mont-royal-1.4238765
m m
at 1:49 pm
Airbnb can and will an issue for every building, whether condo or apartment rental. It’s difficult to enforce a ban. The only way would be for a municipality to ban it, like NY and New Orleans did, and others severely restricted.
Max
at 5:40 pm
I never used my condo’s party room for the exact reason you mentioned. 3 hours minimum at $25/hr and a non refundable fee of $120. It would make sense to post a deposit that we get back if something is damaged but it is unfair to have to pay extra on top of maintenance fees to use a common element. Why can’t they just monitor with their security camera?!
DJL
at 7:31 pm
No short term rentals. I lived in a condo in the Yonge & Sheppard area that had a high percentage of renters. A fair number of them were rich university kids who’d never lived in an apartment before. Every time one of these kids moved it, it took weeks, sometimes months for them to get it thru their heads that certain behaviours that were no problem back in their detached home weren’t cool in a condo. For example, subwoofers, at any volume level are not appreciated by people in adjoining suites. And no after closing-time, 2AM parties.
Condodweller
at 10:07 am
It is not necessarily the rules but constant reminders from management about what we can or cannot do, mostly what we cannot do, that irks many people. My wife tends to get annoyed each time we get one of the reminders. My take on it is that whatever the rules are, as long as what I do does not affect my neighbours is fair game. If they set rules that defy common sense and logic than it’s fair game to break them.
Remember that rules were meant to be broken and that it is easier to get forgiveness than to get permission.
If you are one of those strong principled people who can never break any rules and always drive at or below the speed limit, you might have a hard time living in a condo.
Sanya
at 11:15 am
I have a dog and kids are more of a annoyance to me than pets – they are louder and can’t put them on a leash. And what about those giant strollers? Some of them have wheels as big as a bike. Condos are not museums and they are definitively not art pieces – they are for living, so let live.
Jennifer Goldhar
at 5:00 pm
My building is now denying Grocery Gateway to bring groceries to your door. If I invite them in as my first do they have that right? This is new for me we have always used the service as do many. Others in our building.
Dianne
at 9:53 am
My condo posts notices in the elevator for the world to see. If they are letting us know about an infraction shouldn’t they send us each a letter. If I am having work done by an outside contractor I don’t think he needs to see these notices on condo issues. I have had guests ask why they are posted there. It can be quite embarrassing.
Darcy
at 1:35 pm
Are these personal notices to you? Or general notices to all, such as building bylaws, rules, regulations? If it your personal notice it should NOT be posted to all. If it is building bylaws or policies, it is put on management to communicate and to post all rules etc so no resident or guest is in the dark or “didnt know” it was a rule.
Sue
at 6:12 am
As a cleaner I have to let you know another problem us cleaners have encountered when someone is hiding out in the sauna in the mens bathroom on several occasions even though our gym is closed for an hour while we clean it. If it were kept open it would then become an issue of no showering, no going to the bathroom within these 20 minutes. I do not think a whole new book should be written about closure times to accomodate a select one or two people. We have security go in and check the washrooms to be sure there are no people before we start cleaning for a reason. One time we did this and the guy was in the tanning booth with the door closed and somehow snuck into the washrooms during our cleaning I started cleaning the washroom did not notice him in the sauna until I turned around from cleaning the bathroom mirror and saw through the small window a shadow. He was in there naked and told me it was O.K. (well, hello… a naked man in there is not O.K. with me) plus that sauna is not getting sprayed down.
Ivan Soroka
at 2:10 pm
I live in my mother’s condo with her I go outside to the backyard with my dog so she can do her thing 2 to 3 times a day done this for 3 years now,someone new has moved into aground floor unit ,one morning I was sitting out the the owner of the unit asked me to move because smoke was coming into her condo I had no problem with that she saw me move but a couple of days later I went to sit in my chair that I have moved further from her place and want me to move further I told her no I am sitting 35 feet from her patio facing the same southerly direction as her high fence patio I am sitting in front of another patio which no one has lived since I’ve been going to the backyard,to make a long story shorter the board of directors received this complaint from her he came to my door and asked me to read her complaint I read it and said and,he replied that I sit somewhere else because she said that I am infringing on her privacy, so I did some investigating on the web than spoke to a lawyer she told me that it a common element and if it’s not written in the contract specify that we have to be so far from her unit which it doesn’t he has no right by law to tell me that,the lawyer said that she deals with this all the time some people who move on the ground level think there going to have there own backyard and try to discourage people from using it every condo owner owns a piece of the land in the common element area,so I told my mother who was quite upset about what he has told me,my mother sits there also with me but the new owner has never come out when I sit with her,the following we run into each other in the elevator,I asked him have spoken to my mother he said not yet,I said she’s not to happy with it,he says I’ll speak to her,I said we spoke to a lawyer and I told him I will sit where I like I told him you don’t make the law ,he replied by saying as he was walking through the door than stopped and asked me if I’m a resident I said yes he said no I said a gain yes like I said I lived in my mother’s condo he left through the door and told me to go F my self,I responded back the same way,he favors people,he breaks the law and lies makes it uncomfortable to live here.
Justin
at 3:33 pm
My condo developed a rule that concierge (who has a huge desk and a huge area beside) can no longer hold oversized packages. If you’re not home when a large package is delivered, they send it back with the delivery person.