Building permits in Ontario

Ontario's legislated permit clock

Ontario is the province that turned permit timelines into law. The Building Code Act sets mandatory decision windows that scale with complexity — 10 business days for houses, longer for larger buildings — and the municipality must either issue the permit or tell you exactly what's deficient within that window. The catch is the word complete: the clock starts only when the application has every required drawing and form, which is why a well-prepared submission in Ontario routinely beats a rushed one by weeks.

Electrical work runs on a parallel track: in Ontario it's overseen by the Electrical Safety Authority, not the municipal building department, so a renovation with wiring typically involves an ESA notification alongside the building permit. Your electrician normally files it — worth confirming, because the ESA record is part of the paper trail a future buyer's lawyer may check.

Finding permit history in Ontario

Toronto publishes building application information online, and several other large Ontario cities offer online permit or application status tools; elsewhere you request the property's building file from the municipality directly, sometimes through a routine-disclosure or compliance-letter process with a modest fee. Ontario's real estate bar searches these files as a matter of course before closing — checking the file yourself before you list, or before you waive conditions as a buyer, simply gets you the same information first.