Ending a tenancy so a unit can be renovated is not the same process as ending one for arrears, and the Board holds landlords to a materially higher bar on notice, compensation, and the tenant's right to come back.
Key takeaways
A landlord planning a gut renovation or a repair extensive enough to require the unit be empty is not choosing between an N4 and an N13 based on convenience — the Act defines exactly when an N13 is even available, and then attaches obligations to it that don't apply to any other termination notice: a longer runway, a guaranteed path back for the tenant, and compensation that scales with the building.
The bar is specific, and it's higher than “a big renovation.” Under section 50(1)(3) of the RTA, termination for renovation is only available for repairs or renovations “so extensive that they require a building permit and vacant possession of the rental unit.” Occasional or minor repairs — the kind that can be scheduled around a tenant, even inconveniently — don't clear that threshold, no matter how disruptive they are to live through. If the work doesn't need a permit, or doesn't need the unit fully empty to be done safely, an N13 isn't the right instrument, regardless of how the landlord would prefer to characterize the project.
Where the N13 threshold is met, the notice period is long by LTB standards: at least 120 days, and the termination date named on the notice can't just be 120 calendar days from the date of service — it has to fall on the last day of a fixed-term tenancy, or, where there's no fixed term, the last day of a rental period. A notice given mid-period that lands 120 days later, but not on a period boundary, has to be pushed to the next period's end to be valid.
This is the feature that separates an N13 from every other termination route in the Act: the tenant doesn't automatically lose the unit permanently. “The tenant can choose to move back into the rental unit after the repairs or renovations are complete” — but only if they give the landlord written notice of that intent before moving out. Once that notice is given, “the landlord cannot refuse to allow the tenant to move back into the rental unit” once the renovation is finished. A landlord planning a renovation with a different tenant, or a higher rent, in mind after completion needs to build that right of return into the project timeline from the start — it isn't discretionary once the tenant has opted in.
N13 compensation, by scenario
Tenant intends to return, 5+ unit building: the lesser of three months' rent and the actual period the unit is under renovation.
Tenant intends to return, fewer than 5 units: the lesser of one month's rent and the actual renovation period.
Tenant does not intend to return, 5+ unit building: three months' rent, flat.
Tenant does not intend to return, fewer than 5 units: one month's rent, flat.
Either building size, work court-ordered or unit is social housing: no compensation owed.
Building size, in other words, roughly triples the exposure — and whether the tenant plans to come back changes whether the payment is capped at the actual renovation timeline or paid as a flat amount regardless of how long the work actually takes. Getting the tenant's intention documented in writing early isn't just about the right of return; it directly determines which compensation figure applies.
An N13 that gets challenged doesn't succeed on the strength of the notice alone — the landlord has to be ready to show the work genuinely meets the section 50(1)(3) threshold, not just that a renovation is planned. That means the permit application or issued permit itself, a contractor's scope of work explaining why the space has to be fully vacant rather than worked around, and a realistic project timeline the compensation calculation can be checked against. Building that evidence package before the notice goes out, rather than assembling it after a T2 or a bad-faith challenge arrives, is what separates a defensible N13 from one that looks, on paper, like a pretext for ending a tenancy the landlord simply wants to end.
Bad faith is the live risk on this notice more than on most others, precisely because the compensation and right-of-return obligations create an incentive to use it as cover for something else — a desire to re-let at a higher rent, or to remove a specific tenant. A landlord who can show the permit, the contractor's genuine scope, and a construction timeline that lines up with what was represented to the tenant is in a fundamentally different position than one who can't produce any of that when asked.
A landlord owns a 12-unit building and needs to fully renovate a unit — new electrical throughout, requiring a permit and an empty unit for roughly ten weeks. The current tenant pays $2,200 a month and is on a month-to-month tenancy with rental periods running the 1st to the end of each month. The landlord serves the N13 on 1 September 2026. A calendar 120 days out lands on 30 December 2026, which is not the last day of a rental period — so the termination date has to move to 31 December 2026, the end of the period containing that date.
The tenant gives written notice of intent to return before moving out. Because the building has 12 units (5 or more) and the tenant intends to return, compensation is the lesser of three months' rent ($6,600) and the actual renovation period (roughly ten weeks, closer to 2.3 months' equivalent). The lower figure governs, so the landlord's exposure tracks closer to the real renovation timeline than to a flat three-month payment — provided that timeline is documented, because a renovation that runs long extends the compensation calculation along with it.
Now take a different building entirely: a triplex, three units, where the same scope of electrical work is planned and the tenant tells the landlord in writing they have no intention of returning once it's done. Fewer than 5 units and no intent to return puts this in the flat one-month-rent tier, regardless of how long the actual renovation takes — if the tenant's unit rents at $1,800 a month, the landlord owes $1,800 flat, whether the work finishes in six weeks or six months. The building-size and intent-to-return questions aren't just formalities on a checklist; they're the two variables that decide which of four genuinely different dollar figures applies.
No. The threshold is that the work needs a building permit and needs the unit fully vacant to be done — disruptive but survivable repairs, even significant ones, don't meet that bar on their own.
The right of first refusal is to the rental unit itself once renovations are complete, provided the tenant gave written notice of intent to return before moving out. The landlord can't substitute a different unit or refuse the return in favour of a new tenant.
Where compensation was set as the lesser of a capped amount and the actual renovation period, a renovation running longer than expected extends the compensation owed along with it, up to whatever the applicable cap actually is for that building size.
No. Where the repairs or renovations were ordered by a court, or the unit is social housing, no compensation is payable under this framework, regardless of building size or the tenant's intention to return.
The right of first refusal, and the higher compensation tier tied to it, both depend on the tenant giving written notice of intent to return before moving out. Silence isn't the same as that written notice, which is exactly why the compensation tiers are structured around whether that notice was actually given, not around what the tenant might have intended.
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