Ontario · Condominium Act, 1998

When do we have to answer this records request?

Enter the date the request arrived. This runs in two stages — the board's response first, then delivery of the record itself — and the second stage depends on what kind of record was asked for.

Date the request was received

Once the board agrees to share it — what kind of record is it?

Core records are the short statutory list — declaration, by-laws, budget, recent financials and a few others. See the full list below.

Date the requester returned their completed response and paid the fee (optional — leave blank if they haven't yet)

Board's response due by

—

the board must tell the requester yes, no, and the fee — s. 13.3(6), O. Reg. 48/01

✓ Verified August 27, 2026 · Condominium Act, 1998, s. 55 & O. Reg. 48/01, s. 13.3

Sources checked automatically every Monday. Last check October 5, 2026, no change found. See the record

O. Reg. 48/01, s. 13.3(6) — "the board shall determine whether the corporation will allow the requester to examine or obtain a copy of the record that the requester has requested and shall respond to the requester within 30 days."

Then: when must the record actually be delivered?

This only applies once the board agrees to share the record. Choose a record type above to see this deadline.

The delivery clock does not start on its own — every one of these periods runs from the corporation receiving your completed response and the fee, not from the board's response date. If you never send those back, this second deadline never starts. O. Reg. 48/01 ss. 13.3(11), 13.4–13.7

Who can ask

The Act extends this right to a specific list — check before treating anyone else's request as covered.

An owner of a unit.
A purchaser of a unit.
A mortgagee of a unit.
An agent of any of the above, authorized in writing.

Condominium Act, 1998, s. 55(3).

What's off-limits, even to them

Four categories are excluded outright under s. 55(4) — see the explanation below for what each one actually covers.

Employee records (except an employment contract itself)
Actual or contemplated litigation, or insurance investigation records
Records about specific units or owners (with an exception for your own unit)
A short list of prescribed records — mainly legal opinions about specific units and contact-address records

Condominium Act, 1998, s. 55(4); O. Reg. 48/01 s. 13.11.

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Two clocks: the board's response, then delivery

Section 55(3) of the Condominium Act, 1998 gives an owner, purchaser or mortgagee — or their authorized agent — the right to examine or copy the corporation's records, "except those records described in subsection (4)." The mechanics live in O. Reg. 48/01. The first deadline is exact and applies to every request:

"When the corporation receives a request for records in accordance with this section, the board shall determine whether the corporation will allow the requester to examine or obtain a copy of the record that the requester has requested and shall respond to the requester within 30 days in a form specified in the Table to section 16.1." — s. 13.3(6)

That response tells the requester whether the board will allow access, what the fee is, and where the record can be examined or picked up. It is not the end of the process — it is the board's answer, not the record itself.

Delivery is a second, separate clock — and it branches

If the board agrees to share the record, the requester completes and returns the board's response form together with payment of the fee (s. 13.3(11)). Only once the corporation receives that does the delivery clock start — and how long it runs depends on whether the record is a "core record":

Core record, delivered or examined electronically: no separate clock — it must go out within the same 30-day window the board's response was due in (ss. 13.4(1), 13.6(1)).
Core record, paper or in person: within 7 days of the corporation receiving the requester's response and the fee (ss. 13.4(2)–(3), 13.6(2), 13.6(4)).
Not a core record (any format): within 30 days of the corporation receiving the requester's response and the fee (ss. 13.5, 13.7).

Whether a request is to examine a record or to obtain a copy of it doesn't change these counts — only the core/non-core status and the delivery format do.

What counts as a "core record"

O. Reg. 48/01 defines "core record" as a fixed, short list — everything else is a non-core record, on the slower 30-day-after-payment clock:

The declaration, by-laws and rules of the corporation.
Certain agreements under s. 113 or s. 154(5) of the Act.
The current fiscal year's budget, and any amendments to it.
The most recent board-approved financial statements.
The most recent auditor's report.
The board's current reserve fund plan.
Records the corporation must maintain under s. 46.1(3) or s. 83(3) of the Act.
Periodic information certificates sent in the past 12 months.
Minutes of owners' or board meetings held in the past 12 months.

A ten-year-old set of minutes, an individual service contract, or most correspondence would not make this list — those are non-core records.

What the board can withhold

Section 55(4) excludes four categories from the right of access entirely:

"(a) records relating to employees of the corporation, except for contracts of employment…; (b) records relating to actual or contemplated litigation, as determined by the regulations, or insurance investigations…; (c) subject to subsection (5), records relating to specific units or owners; or (d) any prescribed records."

Clause (c) has a built-in carve-back: it does not stop an owner, purchaser or mortgagee from getting records about their own unit, or the s. 46.1 owners' record (s. 55(5)). "Actual or contemplated litigation" is itself defined in the regulation — contemplated litigation means "any matter that might reasonably be expected to become actual litigation" based on what the corporation already knows, not merely a request the board would rather not deal with. The "prescribed records" in clause (d) are a short, specific list under s. 13.11(2): mainly a lawyer's or paralegal's opinion about specific units or owners (and communications about it), owners' electronic-communication addresses, and the parts of ballots or proxies that identify specific units.

Is 30 days really the exact figure, or is that rounded?: It's exact. Section 13.3(6) of O. Reg. 48/01 says the board "shall respond to the requester within 30 days" — no rounding involved, unlike the "5 days" figure on our notice-of-meeting tool, which turned out to be guidance rather than a stated deadline.
Does the fee delay the board's 30-day response?: No — the board's response, including what the fee will be, is due within the same 30 days regardless. It's the delivery clock (stage two) that depends on the fee: it doesn't start until the corporation actually receives your completed response form and payment.
What if the board says no?: Then there's no delivery stage to calculate — the board's response itself, with its stated reason and the s. 55(4) provision it relies on, is the end of this tool's job. Section 55(8) sets a penalty for a corporation that, without reasonable excuse, doesn't permit access, and a dispute can be brought to the Condominium Authority Tribunal.
Is this legal advice?: No. It's general information based on the current legislation, verified against the sources linked above. Whether a particular record is "core," exempt, or about "specific units" can be genuinely contestable — for anything disputed, talk to a condominium lawyer or bring it to the Condominium Authority Tribunal.