How to Review Strata Documents Before Buying in BC

August 21, 2026
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The Four Documents That Tell You If a Strata Is Healthy

You’ll receive a strata package with a few hundred pages in it. You do not need to read all of them. Four documents carry almost all the signal:

Document	What it tells you	Read time
Form B Information Certificate	Current fees, CRF balance, known special levies, parking and storage, rental and pet restrictions	5 minutes
Depreciation report	What’s going to break, when, and whether the strata has a plan to pay for it	15 minutes (executive summary + funding models)
Financial statements + budget	Whether they’re living within their means and what the CRF actually holds	5 minutes
Last 2 years of minutes	What’s actually happening leaks, disputes, deferred repairs, planned levies	20 minutes

The health check in one sentence: a healthy strata has a current depreciation report, a contingency reserve fund that’s a meaningful percentage of the building’s replacement cost, minutes that discuss upcoming work openly, and fees that look slightly high rather than suspiciously low.

The single biggest red flag is low strata fees in an older building. It almost always means the CRF is underfunded and a special levy is coming. You will pay for that roof either way the only question is whether you pay monthly or in one $40,000 cheque.

A 30-Minute Strata Document Review Checklist

Work through it in this order. Stop early if you hit a deal-breaker.

Form B, first page — current monthly fee, CRF balance, and any special levy approved but not yet collected. (2 min)
CRF balance vs annual operating budget — if the CRF is less than one year’s operating budget in an older building, be cautious. (2 min)
Depreciation report, executive summary and funding models — look for the recommended contribution versus what the strata is actually contributing. (10 min)
Search the minutes for these words: levy, leak, water ingress, envelope, remediation, roof, elevator, plumbing, repipe, litigation, deficiency, insurance. (10 min)
Bylaws — pets, rentals, age restrictions, renovation approvals, short-term rentals. (5 min)
Insurance summary — deductible amounts, especially for water damage. (2 min)

If steps 1–4 look clean, the building is probably fine. If two or more look bad, price the risk or move on.

The Depreciation Report

A depreciation report is a professional study of every major common component in the building roof, envelope, plumbing, elevators, boilers, parkade membrane, windows with an estimate of remaining life, replacement cost, and funding models showing how to pay for it all.

The rules changed, and they matter to buyers:

Depreciation reports must now be updated at least every five years.
Strata corporations in Metro Vancouver and the Capital Regional District without a report, or with one obtained before December 31, 2020, had to obtain a current report by July 1, 2026. The rest of BC has until July 1, 2027.
Since July 1, 2025, reports must be prepared by one of a defined list of qualified professionals engineers, architects, appraisers, quantity surveyors and certain designated technologists not by a strata council member with a spreadsheet.

So if you’re buying a North Vancouver strata unit right now and there’s no current depreciation report, that is itself a red flag. Either the strata isn’t compliant, or it’s been avoiding a document it doesn’t want to read.

How to actually read one:

Skip the middle. Go to the executive summary and the funding models at the back.

What to look at	What good looks like	What bad looks like
Components in the next 5 years	Small items painting, minor mechanical	Roof, envelope, repipe, elevator, parkade membrane
Recommended annual contribution	Strata is contributing at or near it	Strata is contributing a fraction of it
Funding models	Strata has adopted one and is following it	Report was filed and ignored
Total 30-year expenditure	Fully or largely funded by CRF plus contributions	Huge shortfall assumed to be covered by “future special levies”

The sentence to hunt for in any funding model is something like “special levy required in year X.” If the report itself assumes a levy, the strata already knows one is coming, and you’re inheriting it.

A caution about older buildings. A depreciation report on a 1978 building will look alarming no matter how well run it is everything is near end of life. That’s not automatically a reason to walk. What matters is whether the strata is funding the work or pretending it isn’t coming.

The Contingency Reserve Fund: How Much Is Actually Enough?

The CRF is the strata’s savings account for major repairs. It’s the number that determines whether the next roof arrives as a modest fee increase or a five-figure invoice.

The legal minimum changed in November 2023. Strata corporations must now contribute at least 10 percent of the annual operating budget to the CRF each year up from 5 percent. The requirement is waived once the CRF balance equals or exceeds the previous year’s operating budget.

But the legal minimum is not the same as adequate. Ten percent of an operating budget is a small number relative to a $2 million envelope job.

Rough guidance for judging a CRF:

CRF balance	Read
Less than 1× annual operating budget, older building	Underfunded. Assume a levy is coming
1–2× annual operating budget	Adequate for a newer, well-maintained building
3×+ annual operating budget, or funded to the depreciation report’s recommendation	Healthy. This strata is planning properly
Large balance but a depreciation report showing $4M of work in 5 years	Still underfunded. Compare against the report, not against a rule of thumb

Always compare the CRF to the depreciation report, not to a rule of thumb. A $600,000 CRF sounds great until you read that the building needs $3.5 million of envelope work in four years across 40 units. That’s a $72,500 per-unit gap.

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Form B: The One-Page Snapshot Most Buyers Skim

The Form B Information Certificate is the highest information-per-minute document in the entire package. Read it properly.

Line on the Form B	What to check
Monthly strata fee for the unit	Compare against similar buildings. Suspiciously low is a warning, not a bargain
Amount owing by the current owner	Arrears you may inherit or need addressed at closing
Agreed special levy or one approved but not collected	This is the line people miss. A levy approved before your purchase can land on you
CRF balance	Compare against the operating budget and the depreciation report
Parking stalls and storage lockers	Confirm what’s actually allocated to your unit listings get this wrong constantly
Rental units and rental bylaw information	Matters for investors and for resale
Pet and age restrictions	Deal-breakers that surface late otherwise
Whether the strata is party to any lawsuit	Litigation is expensive and often relates to construction defects
Parcels, alterations and repair agreements	Unapproved alterations by a previous owner become your problem

Form B comes with attachments the current budget, the rules, and the depreciation report or a statement that there isn’t one. Make sure you actually receive them.

One more thing: ask specifically whether any alterations to the unit were approved in writing. If a previous owner removed a wall, added a bathroom or changed the flooring without a signed alteration agreement, the strata can require you to restore it.

AGM, SGM and Council Minutes: The Keywords to Search For

Minutes are where the truth lives. The Form B tells you what has been formally decided. The minutes tell you what’s being argued about.

Get two years minimum. Three is better in an older building.

Search for these terms rather than reading cover to cover:

Keyword	What it usually means
leak, water ingress, moisture	Envelope problems. The single most expensive category in BC strata
envelope, remediation, rainscreen	Major building work, often $50,000–$150,000 per unit
repipe, plumbing, poly-B	Common in 1980s–90s buildings. Expensive and disruptive
special levy, assessment	Money already being discussed
engineer, consultant, report commissioned	The strata is investigating something. Find out what
litigation, legal, lawsuit	Ongoing cost and risk
deficiency, warranty	New-build issues still unresolved
deferred, postponed, tabled	Work the strata knows it needs and is putting off
insurance, deductible, premium increase	BC strata insurance costs have been volatile
elevator, roof, boiler, parkade membrane	Big-ticket items

The pattern to watch for: a repair discussed at three consecutive AGMs and never actioned. That’s a strata that can’t reach consensus or can’t afford the work. Either way, it’s a strata that will eventually be forced into an emergency levy.

Also read the tone. Minutes full of owner disputes, council resignations and adjourned meetings tell you something real about how the building will handle a $2 million decision.

Special Levies: How They’re Approved and Who Ends Up Paying

A special levy is a one-time charge to owners for something the CRF can’t cover.

How they get approved: a special levy requires a 3/4 vote at a general meeting. Each owner’s share is based on unit entitlement usually proportional to the size of your unit not split evenly.

Who pays the part that costs buyers money:

The general rule is that the owner on title when the levy is approved is liable. So a levy approved in March, payable in September, belongs to whoever owned the unit in March, even if you complete in June.

But this is exactly the kind of thing that gets negotiated in a contract of purchase and sale, and standard forms often address it. What matters in practice:

Check the Form B for any levy approved but not yet collected.
Check recent minutes for a levy under discussion but not yet voted.
Address it explicitly in your offer. If a levy is pending, negotiate who pays before you remove subjects, not after.

Rough magnitude, so you know what’s at stake:

Project	Typical per-unit cost
Roof replacement	$5,000–$20,000
Elevator modernization	$8,000–$25,000
Repipe	$10,000–$25,000
Window replacement	$15,000–$40,000
Full building envelope remediation	$40,000–$150,000+

Envelope remediation is the one that ruins people. In a leaky-condo remediation, six-figure per-unit levies are not unusual, and they often arrive with very little warning to a buyer who didn’t read the minutes.

Bylaws That Can Change Your Plans: Pets, Rentals, Age and Renovations

Bylaws are boring right up to the moment they stop you doing the thing you bought the place for.

Rentals. BC legislation removed strata rental restrictions, so a strata can no longer bar you from renting long term. But short-term rentals are a different question stratas can and do prohibit rentals under 30 days, and provincial rules on top of that make most Airbnb plans unworkable. Do not buy an “Airbnb investment condo” without reading both the bylaws and the provincial rules.

Age restrictions. Most age restrictions were eliminated, with one exception: stratas may maintain a 55+ restriction. If a building is 55+, confirm exactly how it applies to occupants and family members.

Pets. Still fully enforceable. Weight limits, breed limits, number limits and outright bans all exist. Read the actual bylaw, not the listing.

Alterations and renovations. Almost every strata requires written approval before you change flooring, move plumbing, alter walls or touch anything on the exterior. Flooring is the most common flashpoint many bylaws require a specific acoustic underlay or prohibit hard surfaces above the ground floor entirely. If your plan is to rip out the carpet, check first.

Other bylaws worth reading: parking and visitor parking, storage, balcony use, barbecues, smoking (including cannabis), and move-in fees.

How Long You Need for Document Review and the Subject Clause to Use

Realistic timing:

Step	Time
Strata provides documents after request	Up to 2 weeks by law, often faster if the seller pre-ordered them
Your review	1–2 hours for a competent read, longer if there are issues
Professional review (lawyer or strata document review service)	2–5 business days, $200–$500

Build 7 to 10 business days into your subject period for strata document review. Less than a week is tight, and the most common failure mode is a buyer who receives 400 pages on day six of a seven-day subject period and removes subjects without reading them.

The subject clause you want should cover receipt and approval not just receipt. Something in the shape of:

Subject to the Buyer, on or before [date], receiving and approving the strata corporation’s Form B Information Certificate with attachments, the registered bylaws and rules, the current depreciation report, financial statements and budget, and the minutes of all council, annual and special general meetings for the past two years.

Two additions worth discussing with your agent or lawyer: an approval standard in the Buyer’s sole discretion, and a specific carve-out addressing responsibility for any special levy approved before completion. This sits alongside the rest of the contract conditions used in BC purchases.

And use the time. A subject clause you don’t act on is just a delay.

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Frequently Asked Questions

What should I look for first in a strata package?

The Form B. It gives you the fee, CRF balance, any approved special levy, parking and storage allocation, and bylaw restrictions in about five minutes.

Is the strata financially healthy?

Compare the CRF balance against both the annual operating budget and the depreciation report’s recommended funding. A CRF under one year’s operating budget in an older building usually signals a levy ahead.

How much should a strata have in its contingency reserve fund?

The legal minimum contribution is 10 percent of the annual operating budget per year, waived once the CRF matches the prior year’s operating budget. But adequacy depends entirely on the depreciation report judge against upcoming work, not against a percentage.

Do all BC stratas need a depreciation report now?

Effectively yes. Reports must be updated every five years, and stratas in Metro Vancouver and the Capital Regional District without a current one were required to obtain one by July 1, 2026. Elsewhere in BC the deadline is July 1, 2027.

Who pays a special levy the buyer or the seller?

Generally the owner on title when the levy is approved. But this is negotiable in the contract, and a levy under discussion but not yet voted is a real risk. Handle it in the offer, before subject removal.

How far back should I read the minutes?

Two years minimum, three in a building over 25 years old. Search for keywords rather than reading everything.

Can a strata stop me from renting my unit?

Not for long-term rentals provincial legislation removed those restrictions. Stratas can still prohibit short-term rentals under 30 days, and provincial short-term rental rules apply on top of that.

What are the most expensive strata repairs?

Building envelope remediation by a wide margin, at $40,000 to $150,000+ per unit. Then windows, repipes, elevator modernization and roofs.

How long do I need for strata document review?

Build 7 to 10 business days into your subject period. The strata has up to two weeks to produce documents, and you need real time to read them or have them reviewed.

Should I pay for a professional strata document review?

For $200 to $500, on a purchase of several hundred thousand dollars, in a building over 20 years old yes. It’s the cheapest insurance in the transaction.

Are low strata fees a good sign?

Usually the opposite, especially in an older building. Low fees often mean the CRF is being underfunded and the cost is being deferred into a future special levy that you will pay.

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Want a Second Set of Eyes on Your Strata Package?

Two condos in the same Lonsdale building can carry wildly different risk depending on what the last three AGMs discussed. And the buyers who get hurt are almost never the ones who read the documents they’re the ones who ran out of subject-period time and signed anyway.

Navid Hakimi treats strata document review as a core part of every condo and townhome purchase: pulling the full package early so you have real time to read it, cross-checking the CRF against the depreciation report’s funding recommendation, searching the minutes for the words that cost money, and writing a subject clause that actually protects you if something surfaces.

Send Navid the address of a strata unit you’re considering and he’ll tell you what the documents say before you write.

📞 604-347-6084 or request a consultation.