How Do I Handle Subleasing or Roommates? 2026 Ontario Guide

Subletting and roommates in Ontario 2026 landlord guide

“My tenant wants to bring in a roommate.” “My tenant wants to sublet for the summer.” “My tenant has moved out and someone I have never met is living in the unit.” In Ontario, those are three different legal situations, with three different answers — and treating one as another is how landlords lose rights they actually had. The 2023 version of this article treated subleasing and roommates as one marketing problem. In 2026, they are a rules problem, and the rules run on short clocks: seven days to answer a consent request, and sixty days to act once you discover an unauthorized occupant.

This guide is written for Ontario landlords and property owners. It explains, in plain terms, the difference between a co-tenant, an occupant or roommate, a subtenant, and an assignee; when you must consent and when you may refuse; what you may charge; what happens if you do nothing; and the steps to take, in order, for each situation. It is general information about the Residential Tenancies Act, 2006 (RTA) and Landlord and Tenant Board (LTB) practice, not legal advice for a specific file. If a tenancy is already in dispute, get advice from a licensed paralegal or lawyer before a deadline passes — in this area, deadlines are the case.

TL;DR

  • Four labels, four answers: a co-tenant signed the lease with you; an occupant or roommate lives with a tenant who still lives in the unit; a subtenant takes the whole unit temporarily while the tenant intends to return; an assignee takes over the tenancy permanently.
  • Roommates: while the tenant still lives in the unit, a tenant may have an occupant or roommate with or without your consent (LTB Guideline 21). You cannot ban guests or roommates, charge extra rent or a fee for an occupant, or set visiting hours. The tenant stays fully responsible for rent, damage, and disturbance caused by the people they let in.
  • Assignment and sublet both need your consent. Answer a request within 7 days. Silence counts: if you refuse an assignment in general, or do not respond within 7 days, the tenant may give notice to end the tenancy within 30 days after the request, with a termination date at least 30 days after the notice (28 days for a daily or weekly tenancy).
  • Once you consent in principle, you may refuse a specific proposed assignee or subtenant only for a reason that is not arbitrary or unreasonable — for example, a failed credit or reference check done lawfully, unverifiable income, a poor rental history, or occupancy that would breach legal standards. Never refuse on a ground protected by the Ontario Human Rights Code.
  • You may charge only your reasonable out-of-pocket expenses actually incurred in giving consent, such as a credit check you actually ran. No flat transfer fee, no profit fee, and no extra rent for an occupant.
  • A subtenant may not be charged more than the lawful rent for the unit. During a sublet the original tenant remains liable to you for rent and breaches; the subtenant is liable to the tenant, not directly to you.
  • An assignment transfers the same tenancy agreement, on the same rent and terms. The assignee is not responsible for the outgoing tenant’s breaches from before the assignment; the outgoing tenant remains responsible for those earlier breaches.
  • The 60-day clock is unforgiving: if a tenant vacates and leaves someone behind without consent, that person is an unauthorized occupant. Apply on Form A2 no later than 60 days after you discover them, or the occupant becomes a tenant by deemed assignment. The same 60-day limit applies to evicting an overholding subtenant after a sublet ends.
  • Toronto short-term rental is a separate track: a tenant listing the unit on Airbnb is not an ordinary sublet. Toronto registration ($390 per year) is for a principal residence only, entire-unit rentals are capped at 180 nights a year, the Municipal Accommodation Tax is 6% since August 1, 2026, plus 13% HST — and a City registration does not prove you consented under the lease or the RTA.

Table of Contents

First, name it correctly: co-tenant, occupant, subtenant, assignee

Co-tenant. A person who signed the tenancy agreement with you, alongside the other tenant or tenants. Co-tenants on one agreement are jointly responsible for the whole rent, not just “their share,” unless the facts show separate tenancies. Adding a roommate as a co-tenant creates a new agreement or an amendment — you are not required to agree to add someone to the lease, even though that same person may live in the unit as an occupant (below).

Occupant or roommate. A person who lives in the unit with the tenant, at the tenant’s invitation, but who did not sign the lease and has no direct contractual relationship with you. The RTA does not define “occupant” or “roommate.” An occupant cannot file an LTB application about the tenancy against you or against the tenant; any rights they have outside the RTA belong in court. If the occupant pays part of the rent to the tenant, or even directly to you, that payment alone does not make them a tenant — the tenant remains liable for the full rent.

Subtenant. A person to whom the tenant gives the right to occupy the whole unit under section 97 of the RTA. For a true subtenancy, the tenant must vacate the unit, give occupancy for a term ending on a specified date before the end of the tenant’s term, retain the right to resume occupancy at the end, and obtain your consent. If the tenant stays and someone moves in with them, that is not a sublet — it is a roommate. A common trap: in the ordinary case there cannot be a sublet of a month-to-month tenancy, because the sublet must end before the tenant’s term ends; the LTB Guideline notes it is only theoretically possible for a period of one month less a day.

Assignee. A person to whom the tenant permanently transfers their interest in the tenancy, with your consent, under section 95. The assignee steps into the same agreement. The tenant does not intend to return. If the tenant has in fact left for good, do not paper it as a “sublet” to keep the old tenant on the hook — the label does not control; the facts do, and the Board is required to look at the real substance of the arrangement.

One more label matters: unauthorized occupant. That is a person left in the unit after the tenant vacates, without a consented assignment or sublet — including a former roommate who simply stays on. That situation has its own remedy and its own 60-day deadline, covered below.

And one exception to learn early: a spouse is not always just an occupant. Under Ontario Regulation 516/06, a surviving spouse, and in defined circumstances a spouse who remains after a tenant vacates without notice or an agreement to terminate, can be included in the definition of “tenant.” Do not treat a remaining spouse as an unauthorized occupant without checking that regulation first.

Roommates and guests: what you cannot stop, and what you can do

Start with the rule most landlords get wrong. LTB Interpretation Guideline 21 states it plainly: in the ordinary circumstance, a person may reside as an occupant or roommate in a rental unit with or without the consent of the landlord, provided the tenant also resides in the rental unit. A lease clause that bans guests, bans roommates, requires your permission for an overnight guest, sets visiting hours, or adds rent or a fee per occupant does not override that position, and relying on such a clause can put you on the wrong side of a tenant application.

That does not leave you without tools. It changes which tools are lawful:

  • The tenant answers for their people. The tenant remains fully responsible for rent, and for undue damage, illegal acts, and substantial interference with reasonable enjoyment caused by their occupants, roommates, and guests. If a roommate causes the problem, your notices and applications are normally against the tenant — see our tenant complaints and disputes guide for the warning, form, and evidence sequence.
  • Overcrowding is about legal standards, not headcount preference. Occupancy may become a legal issue only where the number of people, on a continuing basis, contravenes health, safety, or housing standards required by law (RTA section 67 in the current Act’s numbering for the overcrowding ground). That is a municipal property-standards, fire-code, and building question — for example, Toronto’s Property Standards rules set minimum sleeping-room area per person — not a landlord’s personal limit. Document the standard you say is breached, get an inspection where you can, and take advice before serving a notice; a notice that requires the tenant to reduce occupancy within 7 days is void if the tenant complies in time.
  • No subdividing. A tenant may let someone live with them, even with exclusive use of part of the home such as a basement, but the home remains one rental unit. The tenant cannot turn your one tenancy into separate tenancies of their own.
  • Ask, do not demand. You may encourage tenants to tell you who is living in the unit — for emergency contacts, insurance, parking, and building security, that information helps everyone — and a condo corporation may have its own lawful registration requirements. What you cannot do is make the tenant’s right to have a roommate conditional on your approval.
  • If the tenant leaves, the answer changes completely. An occupant’s right to be there runs with the tenant’s tenancy. When the tenant vacates or the tenancy is terminated by order, the occupant must leave too. If they stay, see the unauthorized-occupant section below — and start counting days from the day you discover it.

Practical posture that works: be neutral and prompt. Acknowledge the roommate in writing, confirm the lease tenant remains responsible for rent and conduct, restate the building’s noise, garbage, parking, and common-area rules once, and then manage conduct — not presence — if a problem arises. See our landlord responsibilities guide for the duties that do not change when an extra person moves in, including maintenance, vital services, and lawful entry (generally 24 hours’ written notice, between 8 a.m. and 8 p.m.).

Assignment: the tenant leaves for good

An assignment is a permanent transfer. The tenant asks for your consent, either in general (“may I assign my tenancy?”) or for a specific named person. Those two stages have different rules, and confusing them is expensive.

Stage 1 — general consent. You may refuse to consent to an assignment in general. That is your right under section 95. But the refusal has a price set by the Act: if you refuse in general, or you do not respond within 7 days after the request, the tenant may give you a notice of termination within 30 days after the date they requested consent. The termination date in that notice must be at least 30 days after the notice is given (at least 28 days for a daily or weekly tenancy). In other words, a blanket “no” does not keep the tenant — it can end a fixed term early and hand you a vacancy, a turnover, and a re-letting at today’s market. Sometimes that is the right business answer. Decide it on purpose, with the numbers in front of you, not by default or by silence.

Stage 2 — a specific person. If you consent in principle, the tenant may propose a named assignee. At that stage you shall not arbitrarily or unreasonably refuse consent to that person. You may screen them lawfully (see below), and you may refuse for a genuine, documented reason tied to suitability. A tenant who believes a specific refusal was arbitrary or unreasonable may apply to the Board on Form A2 for an order authorizing the assignment, ending the tenancy, or granting a rent abatement.

After a consented assignment. The tenancy agreement itself transfers — it is the same agreement, on the same rent and terms, not a new tenancy at a new rent. The assignee is not responsible for breaches by the outgoing tenant that occurred before the assignment; the outgoing tenant remains responsible for those earlier breaches. The last month’s rent deposit stays with the tenancy; in practice the incoming tenant reimburses the outgoing tenant for it, rather than you collecting a second deposit. Get the assignment, the assignee’s contact and identification information, and the deposit hand-off in writing, all dated.

Partial moves. Where two or more tenants are on one lease and only one wants to leave, that one tenant cannot simply assign “their portion” of the lease on their own. Any change needs an arrangement all parties — you, the leaving tenant, the staying tenant, and any incoming person — agree to in writing. Do not accept rent from a replacement and assume the paperwork will sort itself out; if the leaving tenant was never released, say so in writing, and if they were released, say that instead.

Sublet: the tenant leaves, but intends to return

A sublet is temporary by definition. The tenant vacates, a named subtenant occupies for a fixed period ending on a specified date before the end of the tenant’s term, and the tenant retains the right — and the genuine intention — to move back in at the end. If there is no fixed end date, or no real intention to return, you are not looking at a sublet, whatever the email calls it.

Unlike an assignment, there is no “in general” sublet approval to give or refuse in the abstract: the tenant proposes a specific subtenant, and you shall not arbitrarily or unreasonably withhold consent to that person (section 97). Answer within 7 days as a matter of discipline — the same termination and Board consequences that follow an unreasonable refusal in the assignment context make delay a poor strategy, and a tenant may apply on Form A2 if they say consent was arbitrarily or unreasonably withheld. The Board may authorize the proposed sublet or a different proposed sublet, terminate the tenancy, grant a rent abatement, and set terms and conditions for the sublet.

During the sublet, the legal chain is two links, not one:

  • The tenant remains entitled to the benefits of the tenancy, and liable to you for breaches of the tenancy agreement and the Act during the subtenancy. If the subtenant does not pay, damages the unit, or disturbs neighbours, you pursue the tenant.
  • The subtenant is entitled to the benefits of the tenancy, and liable to the tenant, for breaches of the subletting agreement and the Act during the subtenancy. You and the subtenant are not directly liable to each other for breaches of the tenancy agreement.
  • The subtenant has no right to occupy after the subtenancy ends. A subtenancy does not roll into a month-to-month tenancy the way a tenancy does.

Put the sublet in writing before anyone moves: names, exact start and end dates, the rent the subtenant will pay (no more than the lawful rent — see the money section), who pays utilities, a condition record with dated photos at hand-over and at return, key and fob count, and the tenant’s forwarding contact information while they are away. Most sublet disputes are lost on missing paper, not on missing rights. Our Ontario lease agreement guide covers the Standard Form of Lease terms a sublet cannot change.

Use the same disciplined process for every assignment and sublet request. It protects the decision if the Board ever reviews it.

  1. Get the request in writing, with a date. The 7-day response clock runs from the tenant’s request. An email or letter that names the request, the person (for a specific request), and the proposed dates removes any argument about when the clock started. If a tenant asks verbally, confirm the request back in writing the same day, with the date.
  2. Answer the general question first, if that is what was asked. For an assignment, say in writing whether you consent in principle. Know before you answer that a general refusal, or no answer within 7 days, gives the tenant the termination right described above.
  3. Ask only for lawful screening information. Request the proposed person’s consent to a credit check, plus credit references, rental history, and income information, handled together as Ontario human-rights rules require (next section). Do not ask for information the rules do not permit, and do not demand a new deposit, a guarantor you would not require of any tenant, or documents unrelated to suitability.
  4. Decide within 7 days, and give the reason in writing. Consent, or refuse with the specific, documented ground. “Not a good fit” is not a ground. A dated screening result, an unverifiable reference, or a legal occupancy limit is.
  5. Paper the outcome. For a consent: a short written assignment or sublet agreement signed by all parties, with dates, rent, deposit hand-off, keys, condition record, and — for a sublet — the return date stated twice. For a refusal: keep the request, your response, and the screening record together in the tenancy file.
  6. Calendar the follow-up. For a sublet: the end date, minus a week, to confirm return arrangements. For either: the date you first learn anything has gone off-script, because that discovery date can start a 60-day clock.

If you use the current LTB forms, use the current versions. The Board replaced many forms on September 21, 2026, and old versions are not accepted after November 30, 2026, on the files those changes cover. Form A2 — Application About a Sublet or an Assignment — is the form for the disputes in this guide, for both tenants and landlords; the A2 instructions direct filers to the Board’s current Filing and Fees page for the fee that applies to them, so check that page when you file rather than relying on a number in an old guide.

Screening a proposed assignee or subtenant, lawfully

You may screen. You may not discriminate, and you may not use screening as a disguised blanket refusal. Ontario Regulation 290/98 under the Human Rights Code sets the business practices a landlord may use in selecting prospective tenants: income information, credit checks, credit references, rental history, and guarantees. In practice:

  • Credit checks require the person’s consent. A lack of rental or credit history should not be counted against an applicant.
  • Income information should be considered together with any available rental history, credit references, and credit check — it may be considered on its own only when no other information is available, and then only to confirm the person has enough income to pay the rent. Applying a rigid rent-to-income cut-off, such as refusing everyone whose rent would exceed 30% of income, is not a lawful stand-alone rule for ordinary housing.
  • Never refuse on a ground protected by the Ontario Human Rights Code — including race, ancestry, place of origin, citizenship, ethnic origin, creed, sex, sexual orientation, gender identity or expression, age, marital or family status, disability, or receipt of public assistance — and never refuse because of a ground that is really a proxy for one of those.
  • Apply the same criteria, in the same order, to every proposed person, and keep the record. Consistency is what makes a refusal “reasonable” rather than “arbitrary” if it is challenged on Form A2.

Reasonable, documented grounds that commonly hold up include: a credit or reference check, done with consent, that shows a genuine inability or unwillingness to pay; unverifiable income, employment, or rental history after a fair chance to provide it; a prior tenancy record of serious damage or arrears, verified rather than rumoured; or a proposed occupancy that would breach a legal occupancy, fire, or condo standard that actually applies to the unit. See our tenant screening guide for the full lawful-question list.

Money: rent, fees, and deposits

The money rules in this area are short, strict, and often broken by habit:

  • Consent fee: only your reasonable out-of-pocket expenses actually incurred in giving consent to an assignment to a potential assignee, or to a sublet — the classic example is a credit check you actually paid for. Keep the receipt. No administration fee, no “transfer fee,” no fee for considering a roommate (who needs no consent at all).
  • Rent on an assignment: the assignee pays the same lawful rent, on the same terms. An assignment is not a chance to reset rent to market. If the unit is later genuinely re-rented as a new tenancy after the old tenancy ends, different rules apply — do not confuse the two. For context, most units first occupied before November 15, 2018 can be increased only by the annual guideline — 2.1% for 2026 — once every 12 months, with 90 days’ notice; that guideline also sets the interest owed on a last month’s rent deposit.
  • Rent on a sublet: the tenant may not charge the subtenant more than the lawful rent the tenant pays you. A subtenant who is overcharged can apply to the Board for the money back. Splitting utilities or other real, lawful charges should be set out in the sublet agreement in dollars — not folded into a higher “rent.”
  • Rent with a roommate: the rent does not change because an occupant moves in. You may not charge per-person rent, and the tenant and roommate sort out between themselves how they split the existing rent. That split is not your agreement and does not change who owes you the full amount.
  • Deposits: Ontario allows a last month’s rent deposit and a refundable key deposit at actual cost — nothing else. Do not collect a fresh “security deposit” from an assignee or subtenant, and do not double-collect the last month’s deposit on an assignment: it stays with the tenancy and is settled between outgoing and incoming tenants, with the hand-off documented.
  • Who you chase: roommate does not pay their share — you pursue the tenant for the full rent. Subtenant does not pay the tenant — the tenant still owes you in full, and pursues the subtenant. Assignee does not pay after a consented assignment — you pursue the assignee, not the former tenant, for post-assignment arrears.

Unauthorized occupants and overholding subtenants: the 60-day clock

This is the section that costs landlords the most money, because it punishes waiting.

Unauthorized occupant. Your tenant vacates and someone remains — or moves in — without a consented assignment or sublet. That person is an unauthorized occupant. You may apply to the Board under section 100, on Form A2 (landlord Part 3, Reason 1), for an order terminating the original tenancy and evicting the unauthorized occupant, and for compensation for each day they remain without paying. No N-form notice is required first. The hard rule: you must apply no later than 60 days after you discover the unauthorized occupancy. Note the date you discovered it, and how — a visit, a message, a returned-mail clue, a neighbour’s report you verified — because that date will be in issue.

If you miss the 60 days. Under section 104, the occupant is deemed to be a tenant — in effect, the tenancy is deemed assigned to them with your consent, on the existing terms. You cannot then evict them simply for being there. Your remedies from that point are the ordinary ones against a tenant, for a ground the Act actually provides — non-payment, damage, interference, or a lawful own-use process, for example. See our eviction guide for those routes and their timelines. Accepting money from an unauthorized occupant does not, by itself, create a tenancy under section 103 — but delay does. Do not let “they are paying, so I will leave it for now” run out the clock by accident; if you intend to accept the person, paper a proper assignment or a new agreement, in writing, inside the window.

Overholding subtenant. An approved sublet ends, and the subtenant stays. They have no right to occupy after the end date. Either you or the tenant may apply on Form A2 for an order ending the tenancy and evicting the overholding subtenant (and, for a tenant applicant, daily compensation). That application must also be filed no later than 60 days after the subtenancy ended. If nobody applies and nobody makes a new agreement within that window, the overholding subtenant can become a tenant under the same terms by the same deemed-assignment mechanism. Calendar the sublet end date the day the sublet is signed — not the day you notice a problem.

Never self-help. Do not change locks, remove doors, shut off services, or remove belongings to get an unauthorized occupant or an overholding subtenant out. Only the Sheriff (Court Enforcement Office) enforces an eviction order. A lockout creates a tenant application and damages exposure that can dwarf the original problem. Our tenant move-out guide covers the lawful end-of-tenancy sequence, including left-behind property.

Worked example: a summer sublet, with the numbers

All figures below are illustrative arithmetic using published Toronto figures, not a quote for any unit. Change the rent and the answer changes in proportion — the structure does not.

Your tenant rents a Toronto one-bedroom at $2,228 per month — the September 2026 Toronto one-bedroom average asking rent reported by Rentals.ca and Urbanation (Toronto average asking rent overall was $2,554). The tenant’s fixed term runs to November 30, 2026. In May, the tenant asks in writing to sublet to a named person from June 1 to August 31, 2026, while working outside Ontario, and to move back in on September 1.

Handled lawfully, the money looks like this. You reply within 7 days, screen the proposed subtenant with their consent, and consent in writing. Your only charge to the tenant is the out-of-pocket cost of the credit check you actually ran, with the receipt in the file — no transfer fee. The sublet agreement sets the subtenant’s rent at $2,228 per month, the same lawful rent, for three months: $6,684 in total, paid to the tenant, who continues to pay you $2,228 each month without interruption. The last month’s rent deposit is untouched — it is not the tenant’s to spend during a sublet, and it is certainly not a damage fund. At hand-over and again on August 31, both sides sign a dated condition record with photos, and the keys and fobs are counted out and back in.

Now price the two failure modes. First, silence: if you had simply not answered a general assignment request for a comparable unit, the tenant could have given termination notice within 30 days and ended the tenancy — leaving you a turnover, cleaning, repainting, listing, and vacancy. Even two empty weeks at this rent is about $1,114 of lost rent, before turnover costs, against a screening process that costs an afternoon. Second, delay: if the subtenant had stayed past August 31 and nobody filed Form A2 within 60 days after the sublet ended, the subtenant could have become your tenant on the same $2,228 terms by deemed assignment — whether or not you would have chosen them. The lesson is not that sublets are risky. It is that sublets are cheap when they are papered and calendared, and expensive only when they are ignored.

The Airbnb version: a tenant listing your unit short-term

Owners increasingly discover the issue as a listing, not a request: the tenant is away — or has effectively left — and the unit is on a short-term platform. Keep the three legal tracks separate:

  • RTA track. A tenant who vacates and gives a guest or a stranger the right to occupy the whole unit, night by night, without your consent to a sublet or assignment, can create exactly the unauthorized-occupancy and illegal-charge problems above — including the rule that a tenant may not charge more for the unit than the lawful rent in the sublet context, and the 60-day discovery clock for you once you find the listing. Screenshot the listing, with the date, the moment you find it. Do not book the unit yourself, message guests, or confront a guest in the unit.
  • City track, in Toronto. Short-term rental (under 28 consecutive nights) is allowed only in an operator’s principal residence, with City registration at $390 per year, an entire-unit cap of 180 nights per calendar year (renting up to 3 bedrooms in a home you live in is the separate partial-unit lane), a 6% Municipal Accommodation Tax since August 1, 2026, plus 13% HST, and records kept for 3 years. The City has stated it does not require a renter to obtain landlord consent to register, does not verify consent, and does not investigate landlord complaints about consent. So a registration number on a listing proves City registration — it does not prove the tenant had your consent under the lease or the RTA, and it does not make the arrangement lawful between you and the tenant.
  • Building and insurance track. A condo declaration or rules can prohibit short-term rentals outright, and a standard landlord or homeowner policy that has not been told about short-term use can leave a claim unpaid. Those are separate problems from the RTA file, and they do not wait for an LTB hearing date.

If you, as the owner, want short-term income, the lawful Toronto lane is your own principal residence, registered in your name — not a tenant’s side arrangement in a tenanted unit. Start with our Toronto condo income estimate and our Toronto Airbnb management page for what the numbers and the management actually involve, including the platform host-only fee of 15.5% on the subtotal including cleaning fees.

Condos, subsidized housing, and other special cases

Condos. A condo corporation’s declaration, bylaws, and rules sit on top of the tenancy. Many Toronto condos restrict leasing — minimum lease terms, leasing forms, move-in and elevator rules, and in many buildings a complete prohibition on short-term rentals. A tenant’s roommate right under the RTA does not erase a lawful condo requirement that occupants be registered with management, and an assignment or sublet that breaches the declaration can create a compliance problem with the corporation as well as with you. Before you consent, check the declaration and rules for the specific building, and require the incoming person to receive the rules in writing.

Rent-geared-to-income and subsidized housing. Different consent, guest, and income-reporting rules apply, and an occupant or a sublet can affect the subsidy itself. Do not apply the ordinary-market process in this guide to a subsidized unit without advice on the program rules.

Care homes, mobile home parks, and land lease sites. The RTA has special assignment and sublet provisions for these housing types — including a landlord’s short window to ask the Board to find a refusal reasonable on a mobile home or land lease assignment. Treat them as specialist files.

One tenant dies, or a relationship ends. A sole tenancy is deemed terminated 30 days after the tenant’s death, subject to the spouse rules noted earlier; other occupants do not inherit a tenancy by staying. Where a relationship ends, the person who leaves does not stop being a tenant — and does not stop being liable — until the tenancy is properly assigned, terminated by agreement or notice, or ended by Board order. Get any “one of us is leaving” arrangement in writing, signed by everyone, including you.

Students and seasonal moves. The pattern is predictable — a summer sublet, a co-op term, a roommate swap in September — which is exactly why it should be templated: the same request form, the same screening checklist, the same sublet agreement, and the same calendared end date, every time.

What never to do

  • Never ignore a consent request. Silence within 7 days has the same legal effect as a refusal for an assignment, and it hands the tenant a termination right you may not want them to have.
  • Never refuse a specific person without a documented, lawful reason — and never put a protected Human Rights Code ground, or anything that sounds like one, in the refusal email.
  • Never charge a flat assignment or sublet fee, a per-occupant fee, or extra rent because a roommate moved in. Charge only actual, receipted out-of-pocket consent expenses.
  • Never let a tenant charge a subtenant more than the lawful rent, and never treat an occupant’s direct payment to you as a new tenancy unless you mean to — paper what you intend.
  • Never sit on an unauthorized occupant or an overholding subtenant. The 60-day Form A2 window does not extend for illness, travel, or time spent getting advice, in the Board’s approach described in its guidance and decisions.
  • Never change the locks, shut off a service, or remove a person or their belongings yourself. Only the Sheriff enforces an eviction order.
  • Never backdate consent, a notice, or a discovery date. In these files the dates are the evidence.

When a manager helps

Assignment, sublet, and roommate files fail on process, not on principle: a request answered on day nine instead of day seven, a refusal with no screening record, a sublet end date nobody calendared, an unauthorized occupant discovered in an email nobody dated. A manager’s value here is a system — a written-request rule, a 7-day response standard, a lawful screening checklist used the same way every time, a standard sublet and assignment agreement, and a calendar that flags sublet end dates and 60-day deadlines before they expire.

Typical long-term management in the GTA runs 8% to 12% of rent, plus a placement fee of roughly 50% to 100% of one month’s rent when a new tenant is placed. Home Again’s full-service short-term management is 15%, for owners operating lawfully in their own principal residence. Neither fee fixes a file whose deadline has already passed — which is why the time to set the system up is at lease signing, not at the first sublet request. Our steps to renting out your property sets out that starting checklist, and our landlord liability guide covers the insurance and records side that occupant and sublet files touch.

If you are dealing with a live file now — a request on your desk, a sublet ending this month, or someone in the unit you did not approve — deal with the date first and the argument second. Count the days from the request, or from your discovery, in writing, today.

Frequently asked questions

Can my tenant bring in a roommate without my permission in Ontario?
Yes, in the ordinary case, while the tenant still lives in the unit. LTB Guideline 21 says a person may live in the unit as an occupant or roommate with or without the landlord’s consent, provided the tenant also lives there and legal occupancy standards are not breached. You cannot charge extra rent or a fee for the roommate. The tenant remains fully responsible for the rent and for the roommate’s damage or disturbance.

What is the difference between a sublet and an assignment in Ontario?
An assignment is permanent: the tenant transfers the tenancy to a new person, on the same agreement and rent, and does not intend to return. A sublet is temporary: the tenant vacates for a fixed period ending before their term ends, intends to return, and remains liable to the landlord throughout. Both need the landlord’s consent. A person who moves in while the tenant stays is neither — they are a roommate or occupant, who needs no consent.

How long do I have to respond to an assignment or sublet request?
Respond within 7 days. If a landlord refuses an assignment in general, or does not respond within 7 days after the tenant’s request, the tenant may give a notice of termination within 30 days after the request, with a termination date at least 30 days after the notice (28 days for a daily or weekly tenancy). For a specific proposed assignee or subtenant, consent must not be arbitrarily or unreasonably withheld, and an unreasonable refusal can be challenged on Form A2.

Can I charge a fee for agreeing to a sublet or assignment?
Only your reasonable out-of-pocket expenses actually incurred in giving consent — for example, a credit check you actually paid for, with a receipt. You cannot charge a flat transfer or administration fee, you cannot charge for a roommate at all, and a tenant cannot charge a subtenant more than the lawful rent for the unit.

Someone is living in my unit and my tenant has left. What do I do?
Act immediately and note the discovery date. A person who remains after the tenant vacates, without a consented assignment or sublet, is an unauthorized occupant (a remaining spouse can be an exception — check Ontario Regulation 516/06 first). Apply on Form A2 under section 100 no later than 60 days after you discover the occupancy, for an order terminating the tenancy and evicting the occupant. If you do not apply within 60 days, the occupant becomes a tenant by deemed assignment on the existing terms. Do not change the locks — only the Sheriff enforces an eviction.

Can my tenant sublet the unit on Airbnb?
Not as a casual arrangement. A short-term listing is a separate legal track: in Toronto it requires the operator’s own principal residence and City registration ($390 per year), an entire-unit cap of 180 nights a year, 6% Municipal Accommodation Tax since August 1, 2026, plus 13% HST, and condo rules can prohibit it entirely. The City does not verify landlord consent when it registers a renter, so a registration does not prove you consented under the lease or the RTA. A tenant who vacates and hands the unit to guests without your consent can create an unauthorized-occupancy problem — screenshot the listing with its date when you find it, and start counting the 60-day window.