Toronto Expropriation Lawyer: Fight for Fair Compensation

When the government takes your property, they set the price. Your job - with the right lawyer - is to make sure that price is actually fair.

Just been served? You have 30 days to return your Notice of Election and choose your valuation date, and on Highway 413 and the priority transit projects the right to a hearing of necessity has been abolished, so there is no inquiry to wait for. Read what to do after an expropriation notice first, then call.

Expropriation is the legal process by which a government body or public utility compulsorily acquires private land. In Ontario it is governed by the Expropriations Act, R.S.O. 1990, c. E.26. The Act gives property owners significant rights - but most owners never fully exercise them, because they do not know what those rights are.

Who Can Expropriate Your Property in Ontario?

• Municipal governments - road widenings, transit corridors, park expansions, utility easements.
• Ontario government ministries and agencies - provincial highways, hydro transmission lines, pipeline rights-of-way.
• Metrolinx, GO Transit, the TTC - stations, maintenance facilities, expansion corridors.
• Conservation Authorities and school boards - land assembly for flood management, school site acquisition.
• Hydro One and other utilities - transmission corridors, substation sites.

The Expropriation Process in Ontario

The process follows a defined sequence under the Expropriations Act:

1. Notice of Application for Approval to Expropriate - the expropriating authority serves notice and registers it on title. Where the right still exists, you then have 30 days to request a Hearing of Necessity.
2. Hearing of Necessity, where it still exists - a member of the Ontario Land Tribunal determines whether the expropriation is fair, sound, and reasonably necessary. This step has been abolished for provincial highway takings under the Public Transportation and Highway Improvement Act and for the priority transit projects, so it applies mainly to municipal, regional, and conservation authority takings.
3. Expropriation Plan registered on title - once approved, the authority registers the plan. Your ownership is extinguished.
4. Offer of Compensation - under section 25, the authority must serve a written offer, with an appraisal report, within three months of registration and before taking possession. The offer must include immediate payment of 100% of the market value the authority itself estimates for your land. Taking that money is without prejudice: it does not settle your claim and does not stop you from arguing for more.
5. Negotiation or referral to the Ontario Land Tribunal - if you disagree with the compensation offered, you can negotiate or refer the matter to the Ontario Land Tribunal for determination.

"The authority's offer is a starting position prepared by an appraiser it retained. It is not the end of the analysis, because the Act compensates several heads beyond market value. Signing a release before those are assessed is what closes the door."

What Compensation Are You Entitled To?

Ontario's Expropriations Act entitles you to more than just the market value of the land taken. The full compensation package includes:

• Market Value. The fair market value of the expropriated land as of the date of valuation, determined by what a willing buyer would pay a willing seller without compulsion. The authority's appraiser is not your appraiser. Your appraisal cost is usually recoverable rather than prepaid: under section 32, where the Ontario Land Tribunal awards you 85% or more of the amount offered, the authority must pay your reasonable appraisal and legal costs, and the Court of Appeal held in Shergar that the amount offered includes later settlement offers. Below that threshold costs are discretionary. So the authority very often ends up paying for your appraiser, but it does so through a costs order after compensation is determined, not by funding you up front.
• Injurious Affection (partial taking). Compensation for damage to the portion of your land that was not taken - if the expropriation reduces the value of your remaining property, you are entitled to that loss. A partial taking that splits a lot, removes parking, or severs utility access often causes injurious affection that exceeds the value of the land taken.
• Injurious Affection where no land is taken, and its one-year bar. The Act's other limb, in section 1(1)(b), compensates an owner whose land is not touched at all but who is damaged by the construction or use of the works - the neighbours of a corridor rather than the people in it. Section 22 requires the claim to be made in writing with particulars within one year of the damage being sustained or becoming known, failing which the right is forever barred. Nothing is served on you and no notice tells you the clock is running. The test is narrower too: damage from construction rather than use, actionable but for the statutory authority, and assessed on the reasonableness analysis in Antrim Truck Centre Ltd. v. Ontario (Transportation), 2013 SCC 13.
• Disturbance Damages. Costs you actually incur as a result of the expropriation that are not reflected in market value: moving costs, temporary storage, mortgage penalties, business relocation costs, loss of business profits during relocation, and the cost of re-establishing in a new location.
• Business Losses. If you operate a business on the expropriated property, you may be entitled to compensation for lost profits, customer goodwill, and the cost of re-establishing the business. These claims require careful expert evidence.
• The 5% Residential Allowance. Where the land taken was your home, section 18(1)(a)(i) adds an allowance of 5% of the market value of the residential part for the inconvenience and cost of finding another residence, provided the land was not being offered for sale on the date of expropriation, and section 18(1)(a)(ii) adds an allowance for improvements not reflected in market value. Section 18(1)(b) is a different allowance, for the cost of finding replacement premises where the premises taken did not include the owner's residence, and section 18(1)(c) covers relocation costs. Tenants are dealt with separately. Section 18(1) pays disturbance to an owner other than a tenant, so the 5% allowance is not a tenant's entitlement. A tenant occupying expropriated land is compensated under section 18(2), which pays so much of those costs as is appropriate having regard to the length of the term, the portion remaining, renewal rights or prospects, the nature of the business, and the extent of the tenant's investment in the land.
• Legal and Appraisal Costs. Section 32 is the provision most owners never hear about. If the Ontario Land Tribunal awards you 85% or more of the amount the authority offered, the authority must pay your reasonable legal, appraisal, and other costs, and you do not have to beat the offer outright to get there. The qualification: in Shergar Development Inc. v. Windsor (City) the Court of Appeal held that "the amount offered" is not limited to the section 25 offer, so later settlement offers count and an improved offer raises the bar. Below 85% costs fall to the Tribunal's discretion under section 32(2) and can be ordered against you. Favourable, but conditional on how offers are handled.
• Interest. Section 33 carries interest at 6% per year on the market value and injurious affection portions, running from the date you cease to reside on or make productive use of the land. It does not run on disturbance damages. The Tribunal may allow up to 12% where the authority caused delay, and may reduce it where the owner did.

The Hearing of Necessity, and When It Does Not Exist

For several of the largest projects this right has been removed by statute. The Building Transit Faster Act, 2020 abolished it for expropriations on transit corridor land for a priority transit project, covering the Ontario Line, Scarborough Subway Extension, Yonge North Subway Extension, and Eglinton Crosstown West Extension. The COVID-19 Economic Recovery Act, 2020 abolished it for takings under the Public Transportation and Highway Improvement Act, which is how Highway 413 is being acquired. The Transit-Oriented Communities Act, 2020 does the same for transit-oriented community land, which covers many station-area takings in Toronto. Where a utility expropriates with Ontario Energy Board authorisation the owner's forum is the OEB proceeding instead. Compensation rights are unaffected in every case. Note that removal of the hearing does not always mean no participation at all: section 45 of the Building Transit Faster Act and section 11.2 of the Public Transportation and Highway Improvement Act each let the Minister establish a process for receiving owner comments in place of a hearing, and where one exists on your project, missing its window forfeits the only input you get.

For an ordinary municipal or regional taking, you have 30 days from receiving the Notice of Application to request a Hearing of Necessity. A member of the Ontario Land Tribunal, which took over the role from inquiry officers in June 2021, examines whether the proposed expropriation is fair, sound, and reasonably necessary in the achievement of the objectives of the expropriating authority. You can argue that:

• A different parcel or route would achieve the same purpose with less impact on your property
• The full taking is unnecessary when a partial taking or easement would suffice
• The authority has not genuinely explored alternatives
• The stated purpose does not justify the scope of the taking

The report is not binding on the approving authority, and the approving authority is often the expropriating authority itself, so hearings rarely stop a taking. An unfavourable report can still slow the process and create negotiating pressure. Missing the 30-day window waives the right entirely. Separately, and regardless of whether a hearing is available to you, section 10 gives you 30 days from service of the Notice of Expropriation to elect your valuation date, and that election applies to every taking.

Why the First Offer Is Rarely the Fair Offer

An authority's offer is prepared by an appraiser it retains and pays, and it is directed at the market value of what is taken. The statutory package is wider than that: injurious affection to the land you keep, disturbance damages, business loss, interest and the section 18 allowances are all separate heads, and an offer that is defensible on market value can still leave them unassessed. That is a difference in scope rather than bad faith, and it is why an independent appraisal is worth obtaining before anything is signed. The valuation date you elect can also matter, particularly in a moving market.

"Most owners accept the first offer because it sounds reasonable, and often nobody has explained what else the Act entitles them to claim."

What Is Taking Land in the GTA Right Now

Expropriation demand follows projects, not postcodes. These are the works currently assembling land across the region:

• The Ontario Line. Metrolinx has identified roughly 906 properties for the 15.6 kilometre route, with the heaviest residential impact through Toronto's east end. Metrolinx contacts tenants as well as owners, which matters: a tenant with a leasehold interest can have a compensable claim of their own for disturbance and business loss, separate from anything the landlord recovers. See the Ontario Line and your property.
• Highway 413. Fifty-two kilometres from Highway 401 in Halton to Highway 400 in Vaughan, with roughly 500 properties identified for acquisition and about 2,000 acres of farmland in the corridor. Bill 212 bars owners from applying to adjust the date of possession on priority highway projects, which makes the timeline unusually tight. See Highway 413 expropriation.
• Eglinton Crosstown West Extension. Tunnelling on the 9.2 kilometre extension finished in 2026 and station excavation is underway at Martin Grove, Kipling, Islington, and Royal York. At-grade work on a commercial arterial means partial takings, working easements, and years of trading through construction. See claiming business loss on transit projects.
• Yonge North and Scarborough subway extensions, and GO expansion. Station sites, launch shafts, emergency exit structures, and corridor widening across York Region, Scarborough, and the Lakeshore and Milton lines.
• Utility and transmission corridors. Hydro One and pipeline work proceeds largely by easement rather than outright taking. You keep title and lose the ability to build, plant, or drain across the strip. See easements and transmission corridors.

Expropriation by City

Pages covering the specific projects taking land in each municipality:

Scarborough · Etobicoke · Vaughan · Woodbridge · Caledon · Brampton · Mississauga · Halton Hills · Milton · Markham

For more on civil property and real estate disputes, see our civil litigation page or browse the blog. If your expropriation has employment or business disruption dimensions, our employment law practice may also be relevant.