Property Tax Assessment

The appellant appealed the property tax assessment of their residential property for the 2025 and 2026 taxation years, seeking a reduction from $503,000 to $340,000.

MPAC sought a reduction to $468,000 based on the property's state and condition due to ongoing renovations.

The Assessment Review Board rejected the "state and condition" adjustment, finding no legislative authority to reduce the value for interim repairs.

Using the direct comparison approach, the Board determined the current value to be $491,000 and found no equitable reduction was required.

MPAC brought a motion requesting an order for the disclosure of the appellant's commercial lease for a grocery store property.

The appellant opposed the motion, arguing that producing the full historical lease was disproportionate and that lease summaries were sufficient.

The Assessment Review Board found the lease relevant to determining fair market rent under the income approach.

The Board ordered disclosure of the lease in effect for the 2015 and 2016 years, finding the request proportionate and noting that statutory confidentiality protections apply.

The appellant appealed the property assessment of a mixed-use property that underwent significant renovations to convert commercial spaces into residential units.

The Board determined the effective date of the supplementary and correction of errors assessments to be September 1, 2023, when the new residential units commenced to be used.

The Board largely accepted MPAC's valuation evidence using the income and cost approaches, rejecting the appellant's reliance on a 2016 sale price and modelled rents.

An agreed 8% downward adjustment was applied to ensure equity with similar properties in the vicinity.

The appellant appealed the property tax assessment of a newly constructed but incomplete single-family dwelling, arguing the assessment should remain at the pre-construction value of $966,000 because the property lacked an occupancy permit.

The Municipal Property Assessment Corporation (MPAC) argued that the property had commenced to be used for storage, triggering a supplementary assessment under section 34 of the Assessment Act, and proposed a reduced current value of $2,296,000 based on comparable sales.

The Assessment Review Board agreed with MPAC, finding that the property's use for storage authorized the supplementary assessment, and accepted MPAC's comparable sales evidence to set the current value at $2,296,000.

The Board also found no equity adjustment was required.

The Municipal Property Assessment Corporation (MPAC) brought a motion to strike new documents filed by the self-represented appellant after the deadline set in the Schedule of Events.

The appellant argued the documents merely quantified and organized existing issues rather than raising new ones.

The Assessment Review Board found the appellant failed to comply with the rules requiring consent or a Board order to amend pleadings.

However, applying the rules liberally, the Board treated the appellant's position as a request for late filing and admitted the documents, excluding one withdrawn exhibit.

To cure any prejudice, the Board granted MPAC 30 days to file a written response.

The Municipal Property Assessment Corporation (MPAC) brought a motion for the disclosure of a full commercial lease from the appellant, Metro Ontario Inc., in a property assessment appeal.

The appellant opposed the motion, arguing that it had already provided a lease summary and excerpts, and that producing the full historical lease would be overly burdensome and reveal commercially sensitive information.

The Assessment Review Board granted the motion, finding that the full lease was relevant to determining the property's current value using the income approach, and that its disclosure was proportionate to the issues in dispute.

The Board noted that statutory protections exist for commercially sensitive information.

The self-represented appellant filed a Notice of Appeal seeking to stay a tax sale of his property and challenge a property tax assessment by MPAC.

The appellant had previously missed the deadline to appeal the assessment to the Assessment Review Board and had a related Small Claims Court action dismissed or stayed.

The Divisional Court issued a notice under Rule 2.1.01 of the Rules of Civil Procedure, noting it lacked jurisdiction to hear an appeal directly from MPAC, an out-of-time appeal from the ARB without leave on a question of law, or an appeal from an interim Small Claims Court order.

The proceeding was dismissed as frivolous, vexatious, and an abuse of process.

The appellants appealed the property assessment of their vacant land, arguing it should not be classified as 'land on water' because they did not have a right of way over the abutting Ontario Power Generation property to access the Ottawa River.

MPAC assessed the property at $127,000 based on waterfront access.

The Assessment Review Board found that while the appellants could obtain a licenced access to the waterfront, it was not a permanent right of way.

The Board rejected MPAC's comparable properties and the appellants' comparable properties, instead selecting two of MPAC's comparables that were in the immediate vicinity and had similar licenced access.

The Board determined the correct current value of the property to be $69,367 and found no equitable adjustment was required.

The appellants appealed the current value assessment of their rural residential property for the 2025 and 2026 taxation years.

MPAC had issued a supplementary assessment increasing the value from $1,019,000 to $1,197,000 due to improvements, including a large secondary detached garage.

The appellants argued the assessment was too high and proposed a value of $800,000 based on comparable sales.

The Assessment Review Board rejected MPAC's proposed comparables due to differences in location, zoning, and servicing.

Relying on a comparable property submitted by both parties, the Board determined the correct current value of the property, including the secondary garage, to be $793,092.

The Board found no equity adjustment was required.

The appellant appealed the property assessment of a waterfront single-family dwelling for the 2024, 2025, and 2026 taxation years, arguing the current value assessment of $850,000 was too high and proposing a value of $474,000.

The Municipal Property Assessment Corporation (MPAC) proposed a value of $702,000 based on comparable sales.

The Assessment Review Board rejected the appellant's proposed comparables as they were based on assessed values rather than sales.

Relying on two of MPAC's comparable sales, the Board determined the correct current value to be $687,747.

The Board also found that no equitable reduction was required.

The appellants appealed the property assessment of their newly constructed single-family dwelling for the 2024, 2025, and 2026 taxation years, arguing the current value should be $370,000.

The Municipal Property Assessment Corporation (MPAC) assessed the value at $510,000 based on the direct comparison approach.

The Assessment Review Board preferred MPAC's evidence, noting that MPAC's comparable sales were time-adjusted to the January 1, 2016 valuation date, whereas the appellants' were not.

The Board found the correct current value to be $510,000 and determined no equitable adjustment was required.

The City of Niagara Falls requested a review of a Board decision that cancelled the taxpayers' 2023 municipal taxes under s. 357(1)(d.1) of the Municipal Act, 2001 due to sickness.

The City argued the Board violated procedural fairness when one panel member completed the hearing alone, and that the Board erred in law by not requiring the taxpayers to exhaust all resources to pay taxes.

The Reviewing Member dismissed the procedural fairness ground, noting s. 4.4(2) of the Statutory Powers Procedure Act permits a remaining member to complete a hearing.

However, the Reviewing Member found a significant error of law because the original decision applied a subjective test based on the taxpayers' actual expenses.

Applying the recent M.A.N. v Hamilton (City) decision, the Board held that the objective standard for basic living necessities in a sickness application is Canada's Official Poverty Line (Market Basket Measure).

The Request for Review was granted and a rehearing ordered.

The appellant appealed the property assessment of a newly built single-family detached home in Toronto for the 2024 and 2025 taxation years.

The appellant argued for a current value of $3,679,000, while the Municipal Property Assessment Corporation (MPAC) argued for $4,088,000.

The Assessment Review Board preferred MPAC's comparable sales evidence and determined the current value to be $4,088,000.

The Board also found that MPAC's Assessment to Sales Ratio analysis demonstrated no clear under-assessment of similar homes in the vicinity, and therefore no equitable reduction was warranted under s. 44(3)(b) of the Assessment Act.

The appellant appealed the property tax assessments for a large-format retail food store in Toronto for the 2013-2025 taxation years.

MPAC assessed the property based on a highest and best use (HABU) as a mixed-use redevelopment site, resulting in significantly higher values.

The Assessment Review Board found that MPAC failed to prove a reasonable probability of rezoning within a reasonable timeframe of the valuation dates, noting the lack of a precinct plan and compatibility issues with a nearby sugar refinery.

The Board concluded the HABU was the property's current use and reduced the assessments to $28,731,000 for the 2012 base year and $43,260,000 for the 2016 base year, using the cost approach.

The appellant appealed the property tax assessment of a commercial property operating as a restaurant and food market for the 2023, 2024, and 2025 taxation years.

The returned value was $813,000.

MPAC sought an increased assessment based on the cost approach.

As preliminary matters, the Board allowed the appellant's representative to act as a fact witness, found MPAC provided sufficient notice to seek a higher assessment, and qualified MPAC's employee as an expert witness.

On the merits, the Board accepted MPAC's cost approach analysis over the appellant's single comparable sale, determining the current value to be $1,057,962 for 2023 and $1,077,318 for 2024 and 2025.

The Board also found no equitable adjustment was required.

York University applied for a declaration that four student residence buildings on its campus, built and operated by a private developer, remained exempt from municipal property tax under section 18 of the York University Act, 1965.

The Municipal Property Assessment Corporation argued the buildings lost their exemption because they were used and occupied by the private developer for profit.

The Superior Court of Justice granted the application, finding that the buildings were used and occupied for the legislated purposes of the university, despite the involvement of a private developer, and therefore remained exempt from taxation.

The Appellant appealed the 2023, 2024, and 2025 property assessments for a 231-acre property comprising residential, commercial, and managed forest lands.

The dispute centered on the valuation of newly constructed residential improvements, the classification of a machine shop as commercial rather than residential, and the valuation of the managed forest.

The Assessment Review Board upheld the commercial classification for the machine shop and the managed forest valuation methodology.

The Board adjusted the effective dates for the supplementary assessments of the residential improvements, finding that the pool and pool house were in use by June 2024 and the residence by January 2025, and set the current values accordingly.

The appellant appealed the 2022, 2023, and 2025 property tax assessments of his 99-acre dairy farm, challenging the reclassification of a newly constructed cheese-making and milk pasteurization building from 'rural' to 'industrial'.

The appellant argued the small-scale operation should remain in the farm property class or be classified as commercial.

The Assessment Review Board dismissed the appeal, finding that the conversion of raw milk to cheese and pasteurized milk meets the definition of 'processing' under O. Reg 282/98, thereby justifying the industrial classification.

The Board noted that while the property qualified for a small-scale on-farm business subclass that could reduce taxes, the local municipality had not enacted the enabling by-law to activate the reduction.

The property owner applied to correct a palpable error on the assessment rolls for the 2017 to 2023 taxation years, arguing that the assessed value failed to account for an unbuildable rock outcrop that reduced the effective lot size.

The Assessment Review Board found that the omission of the rock outcrop was a factual error of conspicuous magnitude, constituting a palpable error.

However, the Board exercised its discretion to decline to correct the error.

The Board balanced the financial prejudice to the owner against the owner's decade-long delay in raising the issue and the resulting prejudice to the municipality's finalized budgets, concluding that the principle of finality outweighed the need for correction.

The applicant applied for a cancellation, reduction, or refund of her 2024 property taxes under s. 357(1)(d.1) of the Municipal Act, 2001, citing sickness and extreme poverty.

While the Assessment Review Board accepted that the applicant met the definition of extreme poverty based on her income, it found that she was not 'unable to pay' her taxes.

The evidence showed the applicant held approximately $35,000 in an RRSP in 2024, which could have been liquidated to pay the $6,673.88 in levied taxes.

The application was dismissed.