Brooks et al v. Hogan et al, 2026 ONSC 1423

Court File and Parties

CITATION: Brooks et al v. Hogan et al, 2026 ONSC 1423

DIVISIONAL COURT FILE NO.: DC-25-00003013-0000

DATE: 2026/03/10

SUPERIOR COURT OF JUSTICE – ONTARIO

DIVISIONAL COURT

RE: Alan Brooks and Marie C. Boucher, Appellants

-and-

Hogan’s Haven Family Campground and Archie Hogan, Respondents

BEFORE: Justice A. Doyle

COUNSEL: Self-Represented Appellants

Chris E. J. Ecclestone for the Respondents

HEARD: February 11, 2026 via teleconference in Ottawa

AMENDED REASONS FOR DECISION

1The appellants, Alan Brooks and Marie C. Boucher, appeal an order of the Landlord and Tenant Board (“Board”) declaring that the Residential Tenancies Act, 2006, S.O. 2006, c.17, did not apply to the appellants’ occupation of their cottage at the property of the respondents, Hogan’s Haven Family Campground and Archie Hogan.

2The appellants rented a lot on the respondents’ property (referred to as a campsite in the agreement) from the spring to the fall and spent their time in Florida during winters. Since they paid an annual fee, the agreement was extended every year, and the unit that they purchased on the lot was a permanent structure, the appellants argue that the Board made an error in law in finding this was a seasonal lease falling within the exception under s. 5(a) of the Act.

3The appellants seek an order setting aside the Board’s order and sending the matter back to the Board for a determination of the claims made by the appellants in the original application, which include damages.

4For the reasons that follow, the court dismisses the appeal as the Board did not err in law in finding the parties’ agreement is a seasonal lease and that, by virtue of s. 5(a), the Act does not apply.

Background

5On September 16, 2020, the parties entered into an agreement to lease the lot at the respondents’ property. The lease provides for a “seasonal rental” with three different annual fees and a full-time campers’ annual fee of $2500.

6The appellants purchased a 720 sq. ft. permanent wooden-framed structure that had been built in 1994 (“cottage”) from a third party. It contains a living/dining room area, kitchen, bathroom, bedroom and an attached carport. It is not a moveable structure. Moving it would destroy it.

7The respondents provide hydro, water and sewage services during the open season, which is from Victoria Day weekend (mid-May) to Thanksgiving weekend (mid-October) (“open season”).

8There are no utilities services or overnight stays permitted during the off-season.

9Occupants may build structures compliant with the Township of South Frontenac by-laws, which designate the campground as a “Recreational Resort Commercial Zone”.

10The appellants first occupied the cottage on June 4, 2023, and stayed there during the open season.

11The appellants applied to the Board for a determination, among other things, that the Act applies to the premises as it is a “land lease home” and that the respondents’ complex is a “land lease community” under s. 2(1) of the Act, and that the appellants’ occupation is not temporary.

12The respondents argued that the premises were exempt under s. 5(a) because Hogan’s Haven is a seasonally occupied operated campground.

13Since the decision of the Board, the services were cut off to the premises and the appellants had to sell the cottage on the leased lot at a loss.

Board Decision

14On January 24, 2025, the Board issued a Final Order.

15The Board found that the case at bar was distinguishable from the leading case of Matthews v. Algoma Timberlakes Corporation, 2010 ONCA 468, 102 O.R. (3d) 590. In Matthews, the initial lease covered a 20-year period and the lessees were required to erect permanent structures for year-round use. The structures were used year-round and some as second homes.

16Here, the Board found that the lessees were only permitted, but not required, to construct structures and the lessees did not reside there year-round. Hydro, water and sewage were unavailable during the off season.

17The Board referred to the agreement of the parties which confirmed the campground operating dates and that “[w]hen closing up your site at end of season you should remove all valuables and secure your camper until reopening of subsequent camping season.”

18The three types of annual fees are as follows: seasonal camper who uses campsite on weekends and the occasional week; full time campers who live there the entire season; and campers with one and a half lots.

19In the agreement, the occupiers are told that they must remove all valuables and secure the premises at the end of the open season.

20The Board found that the site was a campground and one of the listed types of accommodation found in section 5(a). The Board held that the park was intended to be seasonal, and the intent of the parties is that the park may not be used year-round and the fact that it is seasonal “is further reinforced by a lack of hydro, water, and sewage services to all sites over the winter”: Brooks v. Hogan’s Haven Family Campground, 2024 ONLTB 58823, at para. 14.

21Hence, the Board found that the Act did not apply to the appellants’ premises.

Appellants’ Position

22The appellants appeal on the basis that the board erred in law in finding that the premises were used on a seasonal basis and rely on Egan v. Kincardine Golf & Country Club, 2023 ONSC 4498, Putnam v. Grand River Conservation Authority (2006), 2006 18526 (ON SCDC), 210 O.A.C. 191 (Div. Ct.), and Matthews.

23The appellants argue that the lease limiting occupation to “seasonal” is inconsistent with ss. 3(1) and (4) of the Act and is void under s. 4(1) of the Act, and rely on White v. Upper Thames River Conservation Authority, 2022 ONCA 146, 161 O.R. (3d) 13.

24The appellants rely on the fact that they are not travellers, tourists or members of a vacationing public and their annual rent of Unit D-7 has been renewed on payment of rent each year since September 16, 2020, to suggest that this was not a temporary rental of premises to which 5(a) of the Act applies.

25The appellants argue that the Board’s conclusion does not follow Matthews and Egan and misinterpreted and misapplied the findings in Putnam.

26The appellants argue that the Board ignored the following facts: that the appellants pay rent on an annual basis and they are full-time residents; the premises are a cottage, a residential rental unit and a land-lease home, and hence a permanent structure; and that there is a permanently affixed trailer (defined as a mobile home in s. 2(1) of the Act).

27The Board failed to apply the Act purposely and as a whole, as required by the modern rule of statutory interpretation set out in Bell ExpressVu Limited Partnership v. Rex, 2002 SCC 42, [2002] 2 S.C.R. 559, at para. 26, and failed to take into account that the Act is remedial legislation.

28The appellants also rely on Curtis Property Management v. Rezai, [1989] O.J. No. 481 (Dist. Ct.), where the court indicated that the mere fact that a landlord called the premises a hotel demonstrated an attempt to evade the provisions of the predecessor statute, Landlord and Tenant Act, R.S.O. 1980, c. 232, as repealed by Landlord and Tenant Amendment Act, 1987, S.O. 1987, c. 23.

Standard of Review

29Any person affected by an order of the Board may appeal the order to the Divisional Court within 30 days after being given the order, but only on a question of law: Residential Tenancies Act, s. 210(1).

30The parties agree that the standard of review on a question of law is correctness: Canada (Minister of Citizenship and Immigration) v. Vavilov, 2019 SCC 65, paras. 33-52, 55.

Discussion

31For the reasons that follow, the court finds that the board did not commit an error of law.

32The Board not only found that the cottage was a permanent structure and that the appellants paid an annual fee, which are similarities to the Matthews and Egan, but the Board also found that, unlike those cases, the appellants’ lease to the unit was seasonal. There was no year-round accommodation. It was seasonal as the respondents only provided utility services during the period from Victoria Day weekend to Thanksgiving weekend and they prohibited any overnight stays.

33The Act is remedial in nature and it must be read broadly to ensure the protection of residential tenants within the Act’s stated purposes: see White, at para. 32.

34Its purpose is set out in section 1:

The purposes of this Act are to provide protection for residential tenants from unlawful rent increases and unlawful evictions, to establish a framework for the regulation of residential rents, to balance the rights and responsibilities of residential landlords and tenants and to provide for the adjudication of disputes and for other processes to informally resolve disputes.

35Section 3 of the Act applies to rental units:

3 (1) This Act, except Part V.1, applies with respect to rental units in residential complexes, despite any other Act and despite any agreement or waiver to the contrary.

36The Act provides exceptions and section 5(a) reads:

This Act does not apply with respect to,

(a) living accommodation intended to be provided to the travelling or vacationing public or occupied for a seasonal or temporary period in a hotel, motel or motor hotel, resort, lodge, tourist camp, cottage or cabin establishment, inn, campground, trailer park, tourist home, bed and breakfast vacation establishment or vacation home….

37In making findings, section 202 directs the Board as follows:

202 (1) In making findings on an application, the Board shall ascertain the real substance of all transactions and activities relating to a residential complex or a rental unit and the good faith of the participants and in doing so,

(a) may disregard the outward form of a transaction or the separate corporate existence of participants; and

(b) may have regard to the pattern of activities relating to the residential complex or the rental unit.

38The case law provides guidance to statutory interpretation. In Rizzo & Rizzo Shoes Ltd. (Re), 1998 837 (SCC), [1998] 1 S.C.R. 27, at para. 21, citing Elmer Driedger, Construction of Statutes, 2nd ed. (Toronto: Butterworths, 1983), at p. 87,the Supreme Court set out the modern principle of statutory interpretation thusly:

Today there is only one principle or approach, namely, the words of an Act are to be read in their entire context and in their grammatical and ordinary sense harmoniously with the scheme of the Act, the object of the Act, and the intention of Parliament.

39More recently the Court of Appeal for Ontario in R. v. Del Mastro, 2017 ONCA 711, 416 D.L.R. (4th) 726, at para. 61, stated:

[S]tatutory interpretation is a multi-dimensional exercise and requires a court to consider whether a particular interpretation complies with the legislative text, promotes the intention of the legislature, and produces a result that is reasonable and just, in compliance with accepted legal norms. [Citations omitted].

40I will now turn to the cases referred to by the Board.

41In Matthews, the applicants leased land from the respondent’s predecessor and erected cottages, which were used year-round as second homes. After the respondent acquired the land, it sent eviction notices to some of the lessees and gave notices of significant rent increases to other lessees. It purported to replace the leases with licenses which gave it an unfettered discretion to renew or terminate the license annually. The applicants brought an application seeking a determination that the Act applied to their land lease community. The Divisional Court upheld the decision of the Board finding that, because the premises were used for recreational purposes, they were not “residential”. The Court of Appeal allowed the appeal and framed the question of whether the cottages were “rental units” within the meaning of ss. 2(1) and 3(1) of the Act.

42The Court of Appeal found that the occupants of the residential units were entitled to the protection of the Act, as the occupants were able to occupy their accommodation 52 weeks a year or some lesser amount of time. The Court found that the premises were occupied for more than a temporary period and for more than a seasonal period. The premises were occupied over many seasons, months and years.

43As in the case at bar, the payment of rent was on an annual basis (there was no seasonal or temporary rental rate) and the leases were intended to be continually renewed over a long period of time.

44However, very importantly, unlike the case at bar, the premises in Matthews were occupied for more than a seasonal period.

45The case at bar also differs from the case of Putnam as the Board found the homes were ‘year-round’ cottages, many with basements, and most with furnaces for winter heating or electric heating combined with extensive fireplaces.

46Although the leases began with strict seasonal requirements and indicated to the parties signing that the lease was for land upon which was to be built “temporary residences”, they evolved over the years. Also, if one decided to sign and pay for access for each of the winter months, they could have accessed their property 264 days in the year. This constraint allowed the Conservation Authority to underline its compliance with the local municipal by-laws that created zoning for the area as ‘seasonal and recreational use’.

47Further, the court found that the likelihood of there being any day in any given year without some resident of the cottage community being present was low.

48The Court noted most occupants had a primary residence elsewhere and ‘go to the cottage’ for various reasons. These reasons were not necessarily ‘seasonal’, however, as the cottages were winterized and available for use at any season of the year. There was a specific finding that the seasonal use was, in fact, during all four seasons, and the facilities such as the snowmobilers clubhouse underlined that the owners wanted to use, and did use, their properties during all seasons of the year.

49Again, in this case, the parties clearly treated the property as a seasonal property. They only occupied the residence for a certain defined season and otherwise would have been unable to occupy the property outside of this period, even if they wished to.

50In Egan, the Divisional Court upheld the decision of the Board where the structures were on a golf course. The occupiers used a structure described as a cottage, erected by the respondent or one of his predecessors. Kincardine did not have a key to the cottage. The respondent and his family had typically used the cottage from April/May to October but there are no restrictions on use during the other times of the year. Access would be more difficult but could be accomplished on foot or by other means.

51All of the other seven lots had cottages with similar leases on them and none of those leases contained a restriction on access for specific times of the year. None of the bylaws or building code provisions prevented the winterizing of the cottages. At least one of the other cottages was winterized and the owners of that cottage at the time, as well as the former owners, lived in it during some winters.

52The appellant asserted that the governing factor to consider in determining whether the rental was “seasonal” was intent. The appellant asserted that at the time the lease was entered into the use of the property was intended to be seasonal only. The appellant pointed to the cost of the lease being membership in the golf club, which was only operational during the warmer months of the year. The appellant asserted that the actual use of the property was seasonal. The appellant asserted that, therefore, the lease was exempt by reason of the inclusion of the word “seasonal” in s. 5(a).

53The court differentiated between a seasonal rental, which involves a premises rented for the season, such as the summer season or the winter season, and an annual rental of premises that is used seasonally, which involves a premises rented annually that is used by the renter only during certain months of the year.

54The Divisional Court held that:

25It seems to me that there is a difference between a seasonal rental and an annual rental of premises that is used seasonally. The former involves a premises rented for the season, such as the summer season or the winter season. The latter involves a premises rented annually that is used by the renter only certain months of the year. The former is the type of residence described by a differently constituted panel in this court in Putnam as “accommodation for travellers, for vacationers, for anyone who needs temporary accommodation provided by someone other than themselves”. The latter cannot fit in that description. In my view the former is exempt by s. 5(a) and the latter is not.

26This interpretation, in my view, is consistent with a reading of s. 5(a) as a whole, where the accommodations listed are those used by persons needing temporary accommodations for travelling or vacationing purposes. Moreover, this interpretation is consistent with the reasoning of the court of appeal in Matthews where that court opined that a renter is entitled to the protection of the act “whether they live in their accommodation 52 weeks a year or some lesser amount of time, and whether the unit in question is their primary or secondary residence”.

27The lease in the case at hand fits into the latter category – namely an annual rental of premises used seasonally. Accordingly, the lease is not exempt and the respondent is entitled to the protection afforded by the Residential Tenancies Act.

55The appellants were paying an annual fee and using the property seasonally but again, there were no restrictions on use during the other times of the year. This is distinguishable from the case at bar, as the respondents prohibited access and shut off utilities making the property inaccessible or uninhabitable for the period outside of the permitted season. The appellants simply could not have occupied the residence year-round, despite their annual fee.

56Accordingly, the appellants appeal is dismissed.

Costs

57As the successful party, the respondents are presumptively entitled to costs.

58I encourage the parties to agree on the issue of costs. If they are unable to do so, the respondent may file a two-page costs submission by March 16, 2026 and the appellants may file their two-page costs submission and their bill of costs by March 23, 2026 the respondents may file a one-page reply by March 30, 2026.