Alterations & Legal Letters
Community Situation Section 98 Alteration Dispute / Legal LetterA City-Approved Renovation Meets a Lawyer's Alteration Notice
A permit-approved basement renovation still triggered a legal memo alleging unauthorized changes to common elements. It raises the question of whether municipal approval is enough on its own.
- Work done
- Washroom exhaust and dryer vent pipe replaced on exterior wall
- City approval
- Municipal building permit obtained and work approved
- Condo response
- Legal memo alleging unauthorized alteration to common elements
- Core question
- City permit and condo approval are two separate systems
An owner got a municipal building permit and finished the renovation work the city required, including replacing a washroom exhaust and dryer vent pipe on the exterior basement wall. After the work was done, management sent a legal memo through a law firm. It alleged the owner had made unauthorized changes to common elements.
The underlying question applies broadly: can a board or manager reject a change that a municipal inspector already approved? City permitting and a condo corporation's alteration-approval process are two separate systems. Satisfying one does not automatically satisfy the other.
Documents an owner in this situation should gather
- The municipal permit and approved plans
- The legal memo received from management's law firm
- Any prior alteration request or approval correspondence with the corporation
- Photos of the completed work
- The corporation's bylaw or rule governing alterations to common elements
Questions to ask management or the board
- 1Does this specific change actually affect a common element or exclusive-use common element under the declaration?
- 2Did the corporation have its own approval process that needed to be followed independently of the city permit?
- 3Is the corporation requesting a Section 98 agreement, and if so, what would its maintenance and liability terms be?
- 4What resolution is being proposed short of further legal escalation?
Facing something like this?
Read the plain-language guidance for this exact situation, or run your own documents through the Free Notice Decoder.
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Curated and maintained by Alexander Baraz, Condo Owner Advocate.
This is a Community Situation: a real situation shared publicly by a condo owner, most often in an Ontario Facebook community group. It is an illustrative community case. It is not a Condo Owner Advocate client, not COA casework, not a testimonial, and not legal advice.