Law360 Canada (October 20, 2026, 11:13 AM EDT) --
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| Michael Lesage |
Outside of defence procurement, the Ontario Superior Court is perhaps the most dysfunctional government entity in Canada. Given that responsibility for the court is divided between the federal and provincial governments, that judges have
decreed themselves above transparency or accountability, and that the system lacks meaningful feedback mechanisms, that result is largely to be expected. Still, watching this dysfunction play out in a small claims sheriff’s sale demonstrates a system plumbing new lows.
By way of background, several years ago, I obtained a small claims judgment on behalf of my client against several related corporations. However, payment was not forthcoming. As such, my client was left with several
options to attempt to enforce, namely via sheriff’s sale of land, garnishment of accounts or an examination hearing (which often leads back to one of the first two). As garnishment was impractical in the circumstances (bank branch unknown and unknown amount maintained therein), my client elected to proceed with a sheriff’s sale. Ultimately, the process cost my client nearly $22,000, only a small fraction of which was legal fees. Like most things related to the Ontario Superior Court, the key question is why?
With judgment in hand, I inquired with the issuing court as to its then current sheriff sale
requirements and prepared the Writ of Seizure and Sale and Affidavit for Enforcement request. I then forwarded both to my process server for filing (generally faster for time-sensitive filings than via the portal), whose bill, including required court fees, totalled $512.62. Next, I obtained the Deed and Abstract/Parcel Register from a provider with Teranet access, for another $224.87. With that in hand, I was ready to obtain a commercial appraisal of the property, which set my client back a further $5,089.50. In addition, I obtained an opinion from a real estate lawyer that there were no mortgages on title (and who also provided me with the municipal tax certificate) at a further cost of $586.27.
With documentation in hand, and close to six months later (and within two weeks of the appraisal date), I was ready to move forward. I completed a Direction to Enforce Writ of Seizure and Sale, along with a separate direction letter to the clerk. With this, I included the various documents set forth above along with a cheque to court for the $8,000 required deposit.
That filing,
like many Ontario court filings, was rejected, as the clerk determined that the commercial property was tenanted. As such (and while the sheriff’s sale documentation indicated the whole of the property was to be sold), the clerk was uncertain as to which unit was to be sold. Via a number of further emails, and additional filing attempts and resulting process server fees of $163.84, $286.34 and $79.09, this was cleared up, such that the matter returned to queue.
Given the property was tenanted, the court disclosed further requirements, namely, to be provided with the names of each tenant, such that notice could be provided. So, once more, the process server was sent to the site to take photographs of the businesses occupying each unit, and my client was billed a further $192.10. This information was then provided to the court. At this point, the court also requested corporate profile reports for each judgment debtor, adding another $32 in cost. This information, too, was promptly provided.
The court got around to processing this information over the next several months. On doing so, the court requested, for the first time, corporate profile reports for each of the tenants. Via internet search, calls to the business and inquiries to the municipality, this information was determined and further corporate profile reports obtained, at a cost of $140.89. However, by this point, the information previously (timely) provided to the court had become “stale-dated.” The court thus required my client to provide a further Abstract/Parcel Register at a cost of $96.50, municipal tax certificate for a further $65 and updated appraisal, at a further cost of $3,596.40. Thus, with HST, disbursements cost over $11,000, which was in addition to the $8,000 deposit paid into court. Lawyer time for the process totalled slightly more than eight hours, though roughly half of that time was spent dealing with filing rejections and redoing steps in the process, due to court delay. Once the sheriff’s sale was belatedly scheduled and notice provided to the owner, payment was forthcoming within weeks.
Like most processes at the Superior Court (though it appears this process is set entirely by the Ministry of the Attorney General), the real question is what steps should be required? For instance, while the Writ of Seizure and Sale and Affidavit for Enforcement Request may each serve a purpose, are the Direction to Enforce and letter of instruction not redundant? Likewise, while the Deed and Parcel Register may be necessary to identify the property and those who may hold an interest, given the cost, are appraisals really necessary (both because buyers take the property subject to all encumbrances, and it can be presumed that most of the time, plaintiffs will not force sheriff’s sales where there is no equity)?
Unfortunately, without meaningful feedback mechanisms — and with both the bench and the Ministry of the Attorney General content to ignore even the most basic public signals of failure (i.e., Google Reviews for the various courthouses) — the Ontario court system’s atrophy was all but inevitable. The question that remains is whether those who hold the power to improve the system will utilize that power or instead continue to offer empty assurances while
gutting what little function remains and on that, the jury is out.
Michael Lesage is a trial lawyer and the founder of Michael’s Law Firm, a litigation boutique that specializes in complex cases involving professional negligence, business litigation, insurance coverage disputes and cases of serious injury. When not representing clients, he can often be found playing competitive sports. He is also a former bencher at the Law Society of Ontario. You can email him at michael@michaelsfirm.ca.
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