Condos, Townhomes, and Detached Houses: What You're Actually Buying

You’re not just buying a home — you’re buying a form of ownership

Every Canadian home falls into one of two broad ownership structures, and which one you’re buying matters more than the paint colour or the kitchen. In a freehold, you own the land and the building on it, and you’re responsible for maintaining all of it.^[1] In a condominium — called a strata in British Columbia — you own your individual unit plus a shared interest in the common property, and a corporation made up of all the owners manages the shared parts under provincial law.^[1]

That single distinction ripples through everything: how much you pay each month, who decides when the roof gets replaced, whether you can have a dog or rent the place out, and what kind of nasty financial surprise can land in your mailbox. A detached house is almost always freehold. A high-rise unit is almost always a condo or strata. But in between sits a category that trips up more buyers than any other — so we’ll start there.

Price tells you what you’ll pay. Ownership structure tells you what you’re actually getting — and what can go wrong.

“Townhouse” is a shape, not a title

One clarification saves buyers from expensive misunderstandings: “townhouse” describes the form of the building — attached, ground-oriented, sharing walls — not its legal ownership. The very same townhouse can be sold two completely different ways.^[2]

A freehold townhouse (or row house) means you own the home and the land under it, and you handle your own exterior, yard, and repairs — much like a detached house, just with smaller outdoor space and possibly a shared-driveway or party-wall agreement with a neighbour.^[2] A condo- or strata-titled townhouse looks identical from the curb, but you own your unit and share common elements, pay monthly fees, and follow the corporation’s rules.^[2] The two carry very different costs and very different freedoms — so the first question to ask about any townhouse is never “how much?” but “freehold or condo?” The same caution applies in reverse: a few detached-looking homes sit in “common elements” condos or parcels of tied land (POTL) and carry modest shared fees. Confirm the title, every time.

Freehold: total control, total responsibility

Freehold is the ownership most people picture: the land and the structure are yours. You decide what to renovate and when — subject to municipal bylaws and permits — and no board can tell you what colour to paint the door. The trade-off is that you bear every cost, and all of the volatility. When the roof fails or the furnace dies, there’s no shared fund to draw on; it’s a five-figure bill that arrives on your timeline whether you’re ready or not. A common planning rule of thumb is to budget roughly 1% of your home’s value each year for maintenance (covered in Owning a Home).

Because there’s no corporation and no status document, your due diligence on a freehold rests on a title search (to surface easements, shared driveways, or restrictive covenants), a survey, a thorough home inspection, and the seller’s disclosures.^[2] What you see is what you’re responsible for.

Condo / strata: shared cost, shared control, shared risk

Buy a condo or strata and you own your unit plus a proportionate share of the common property — lobbies, hallways, the roof, the elevator, the grounds — all run by a corporation that every owner belongs to. In Ontario that’s a condominium corporation under the Condominium Act, 1998; in BC, a strata corporation under the Strata Property Act.^[1] You pay a monthly fee — legally “common expenses” in Ontario, “strata fees” in BC — set as your unit’s proportionate share of the budget.^[3]

Those fees buy real things: building insurance, common-area utilities, professional management, cleaning, landscaping, snow removal, elevator servicing, any amenities like a gym or pool — and, critically, a monthly contribution to the reserve fund (more on that next).^[3] The upside is predictability: major repairs are someone’s job and are funded in advance, and you never personally shovel the walk. The trade-off is autonomy. A board (in BC, a strata council) sets and enforces rules on pets, rentals, renovations, and parking; you get a vote, but decisions are collective, and your fees can rise — sometimes sharply — when costs climb or the reserve runs short.^[3]

The reserve fund is the heart of it

If there is one thing that separates a sound condo or strata from a money pit, it is the health of its reserve fund — the pool of money set aside for big-ticket repairs and replacements. This is where buyers who only looked at the monthly fee get blindsided.

In Ontario, every condo must maintain a reserve fund and commission periodic reserve fund studies by qualified professionals, projecting decades of future repairs and setting contribution levels accordingly; the study is updated at least every three years.^[4] In BC, the equivalent is the contingency reserve fund (CRF), paired with a depreciation report prepared by a qualified person that estimates the repair and replacement cost and remaining life of major components — roof, plumbing, elevators, balconies, siding — typically across a 20-to-30-year horizon.^[5]

When that fund can’t cover a major expense, the corporation raises the money through a special assessment (Ontario) or special levy (BC): a one-time charge on every owner, calculated by the same proportionate share as your regular fees — and routinely running into the thousands or tens of thousands of dollars.^[6] The mechanics differ in a way worth knowing: in Ontario, a board can levy a special assessment without a vote of the owners, and the obligation is enforceable by a lien on your unit; in BC, a special levy generally requires a three-quarters vote at a general meeting.^[6]

Read the document that tells you the truth

Every province gives a buyer one document that reveals a corporation’s real financial health — and reading it, with its attachments, before you remove your conditions protects you more than anything else in the purchase.

In Ontario, that’s the status certificate. It’s mandatory in a resale condo purchase, the corporation must provide it, and the fee is capped at $100 including HST. It discloses the budget, the reserve fund balance, any existing or proposed special assessments, known legal matters, and the rules — and you should have a real-estate lawyer review it, ideally as a condition of your offer.^[7] Disclosure carries real weight: in one Ontario case, a buyer was relieved of a roughly $34,000 special-assessment share because the corporation had failed to disclose it in the status certificate.^[6]

In British Columbia, the equivalent is the Form B Information Certificate under section 59 of the Strata Property Act. It discloses the monthly strata fees, anything the seller owes the strata, any approved special levies, the CRF balance, litigation, parking and storage, and an insurance summary — and it must come with the strata’s bylaws and rules, the current budget, and the most recent depreciation report attached.^[8] One subtlety: a Form B is a snapshot valid only on the day it’s signed, so a form that’s technically less than 30 days old can already be stale if an annual general meeting happened after it was prepared — ask for a current one.^[9] (A separate Form F, the Certificate of Payment, confirms the seller has paid what they owe and is needed to close.)^[9]

In both provinces, don’t just skim the summary — read the attachments: the reserve fund study or depreciation report, the recent financials and meeting minutes, and the bylaws on pets, rentals, and renovations. A weak reserve, a pending levy, or a rule that clashes with your life is grounds to renegotiate the price or walk away. One exception to flag: a brand-new pre-construction unit has no status certificate or Form B, because the corporation doesn’t exist yet — there, your protection is the developer’s disclosure statement, covered in New Builds & Pre-Construction.^[8]

In a condo or strata, the building’s books are part of what you’re buying. Read them like you’d read the inspection report — because they predict your future bills.

Matching the structure to your life

None of these is “better” — they suit different lives. A freehold detached house gives you the most control and the broadest resale appeal, at the cost of bearing every repair yourself and absorbing the volatility. A condo or strata offers predictable costs, shared amenities, and a lower entry price — well suited to first-time buyers, downsizers, and anyone who’d rather not own a snowblower — in exchange for less autonomy and exposure to reserve-fund risk. A freehold townhouse sits in the middle: ground-oriented and self-managed, usually with less exterior to maintain.

Two things hold across all of them. First, insurance: in a condo or strata the corporation insures the building and carries liability coverage, but that does not cover your unit’s contents, your personal liability, or your share of a large insured loss — you need your own unit policy, ideally with loss-assessment coverage — Owning a Home covers the insurance details.^[3] Second, lenders look at the property, not just you: for a condo or strata, they’ll weigh the reserve fund’s health, the share of owner-occupied units, and any litigation before approving your mortgage.^[2]

The home that wins you over at the showing is rarely the thing you’re really buying. You’re buying a form of ownership, a set of rules, and — if it’s a condo or strata — a share of someone else’s balance sheet. Confirm the title, read the reserve and the disclosure document, and match the structure to the life you actually want, and you’ll buy the right kind of home, not just the prettiest one.