New Reporting Requirements for Bare Trusts

Background The Department of Finance Canada has recently announced stricter trust reporting rules that will impact income tax compliance requirements for commercial real estate owners. On November 3, 2022, the 2022 Fall Economic Statement, tabled in Parliament, confirmed that enhanced tax reporting requirements for trusts will apply to taxation years ending on or after December […]

Decision-Making For An Incapable Person

Introduction When a situation causing diminished mental ability arises for an individual (whether a senior or not), the law recognizes that someone may need to step in and make decisions for that person. However, families are often surprised that their ability to make decisions on behalf of a loved one is very limited unless the […]

Shanae Soor Joins MBS as an Associate

Morrison Brown Sosnovitch LLP is delighted to welcome Shanae Soor to the firm as an Associate in our real estate group. Shanae will be building a broad real estate practice that includes commercial, development and residential matters. She joins us after spending 5 years at a boutique firm in Vaughan where she led the real […]

Employment Law Update: Disconnecting From Work Policy

With the passage of Bill 27, Working for Workers Act, 2021 in December 2021, the Province prohibited the use of non-compete agreements, except in very limited circumstances. That topic was covered in a previous post.  Bill 27 also imposed an obligation on many employers to create a written disconnecting from work policy. Disconnecting from work […]

Employment Law Update: Non-Competition Agreements Banned

Updated – March, 2022 The enforceability of non-compete or non-competition clauses or agreements has long been the source of some confusion for both employers and employees in Ontario. While courts were prepared to enforce such clauses in some circumstances, those circumstances were becoming more and more limited as the courts found that there were less […]

Caution to Lenders: How to Recover Costs Incurred to Enforce a Mortgage

Introduction A mortgage is a well-known type of security pursuant to which a lender, such as a financial institution, or a private corporation or individual, lends money to the owner of real property in return for which the lender acquires rights and remedies over the real property which can be enforced if the borrower fails […]

Ontario Court of Appeal Upholds Developer’s Damages for Aborted Sale by Purchaser

While acting for a real estate developer, our Associate, Shane Greaves, successfully argued to have a former buyer’s appeal dismissed by the Ontario Court of Appeal. The developer sold a yet-to-be-built home to the buyer in a transaction that was not scheduled to close until many months later. Prior to the closing, however, the value […]

Real Estate Remedies: Cautions and Certificates of Pending Litigation

Fluctuations in the value of real estate can affect the outcome of a real estate transaction. If the market value of the property increases (between the date that the Agreement of Purchase and Sale is signed and the closing date), the vendor may regret the transaction and refuse to close. How does the innocent party […]