A 20 to 60 unit Ontario condo corporation that self-manages saves real money. Property management for a building that size typically runs $15 to $30 per unit per month, so a 40 unit corporation avoids $7,200 to $14,400 a year. The trade is that the board must run the corporation's records, finances and communication itself. The good news: the software to do it properly costs less than $100 a month total. Here is the realistic stack, and where the cheap version breaks.
Strip away the vendor noise and a condo corporation runs on three functions. Records: the compliance files, status certificates, minutes, owner lists and correspondence that section 55 of the Condominium Act, 1998 requires the corporation to keep. Finances: collecting common expenses, paying vendors, tracking the reserve fund, producing statements owners can inspect. Communication: notices, meeting logistics, and the day-to-day traffic between owners and the board. Budget for each job separately and the numbers stay small.
Small corporations do well on ordinary small-business accounting software. Wave is free and handles income, expenses and reports. QuickBooks Online starts near $25 a month and adds better vendor management and accountant access. Two practices matter more than the brand. Keep the operating account and the reserve fund visibly separate, because the Act requires the reserve fund to be held apart. And reconcile monthly, because a corporation that cannot produce current financials cannot issue an accurate status certificate, and status certificates carry a 10 day statutory deadline.
A shared board email address on a corporation-owned domain beats five personal inboxes, and costs under $10 a month for the domain and mailbox. The principle is that correspondence must belong to the corporation, not to whoever happens to be secretary this year. Add a free scheduling tool for meetings and you are done. Resist the committee that wants a website, a forum and an app in year one. A corporation under 100 units needs owners to receive notices reliably. It does not need engagement metrics.
Most boards start with a shared drive and a spreadsheet, and for static documents that works. The declaration, by-laws, rules, insurance certificates and minutes sit happily in dated folders at $0 to $12 a month for storage. Compliance records are different, and this is where generic tools fail in four specific ways:
For the compliance record specifically, judge any tool against five requirements. It should log issues with dates set at entry time. It should attach photo evidence directly to each issue. It should track delivery of every notice, so “I never got it” has a documented answer. It should keep an audit trail that cannot be edited after the fact. And it should export everything, so the corporation is never locked in. YardRule was built to this list for self-managed Ontario boards, and its Starter plan is $49 a month for corporations up to 25 units, with pricing listed publicly.
Total: roughly $60 to $95 a month, or about $2 per unit. Set against the $600 to $1,200 a month that professional management would cost the same building, the stack pays for itself roughly 10 times over. The condition is that the board actually uses it: logs issues the day they arise, sends letters through a tracked channel, and closes every file with an outcome. Software makes the discipline cheap. It cannot make it optional.
This guide is general information, not legal advice. Confirm the specifics of your situation with a condo lawyer or the Condominium Authority of Ontario (CAO).
YardRule gives Ontario condo boards a documented violation process with photo evidence, delivery tracking and an immutable audit trail. Free 30-day pilot, no credit card.