1185 Birchmount Road Townhouses: 12 Homes, One Tiny 1974 Corporation

1185 Birchmount Road is one of the smallest condo corporations I write about: twelve townhouses, registered in 1974, just north of Lawrence Avenue East. For a family that wants a garage and a basement without a freehold price, it can work very well. With only twelve owners sharing every roof and every driveway, though, you have to buy the corporation as carefully as you buy the house. I’m Jatin Dua, RE/MAX Quantum Realty.

Twelve homes, one small board

Most townhouse complexes from this era in Scarborough have 70 to 120 homes. This one has twelve. Condos.ca lists them under a single corporation, YCC-153, registered in June 1974, which makes it one of the older condominium corporations in the former York County numbering.

At this size, the board is essentially a few of your neighbours. That can be an advantage: decisions are quick, everybody knows who is responsible, and a well-run small complex often feels more like a private street than a condo. It can also be a weakness if nobody wants to serve, or if one owner falls behind on fees and there are only eleven others to carry the gap.

Condos.ca does not list a property manager, and I could not find one named anywhere else. Some very small corporations are self-managed by the board. Ask who manages the complex, who signs the contracts, and how the books are kept before you go firm.

What the homes actually are

Condos.ca records the complex as one floor, which does not describe how people live here. A recent listing described a three-bedroom home of about 1,000 to 1,199 sq ft above a finished basement, with two bathrooms, ensuite laundry, a terrace and a built-in garage, and two parking spaces in total.

That is a family layout: three bedrooms, a usable lower level for a rec room or office, and a garage you can actually park in. The same listing mentioned renovated bathrooms and a renovated kitchen, so expect a wide range of condition from one home to the next. In a complex this old, two homes with the same plan can be decades apart inside.

The listing also showed electric baseboard heat and a wall-unit air conditioner rather than gas forced air. That matters for your budget. Ask the seller for a year of hydro bills, and check whether any owner has converted to a heat pump and whether the corporation has rules on exterior units.

A multi-level home over a basement means stairs every day. For a young family that is rarely an issue. For a buyer planning to stay into retirement, look at whether a main-floor room could work as a bedroom later, and remember that a built-in garage usually takes part of the ground floor that would otherwise be living space.

A fee that covers the outside, not the inside

The listing I reviewed described the fee as covering water, building insurance, parking and exterior maintenance and repairs. Heat and hydro are on you, which fits the electric baseboard setup. Condos.ca does not publish fee inclusions for this complex, so confirm the list in the status certificate.

Exterior maintenance is the important line. It means roofs, siding or brick, and probably windows and doors, are corporation items paid from the reserve fund. In a 1974 complex, most of those components have already been replaced at least once or are due. With twelve homes sharing the bill, a single roof cycle or paving project can be a big number per owner.

Ask for the most recent reserve fund study and look at two things: what it says is coming in the next ten years, and whether the current contributions actually fund it. A small corporation that has kept fees artificially low is the one most likely to need a special assessment later.

Birchmount and Lawrence is starting to change

Dorset Park is a settled neighbourhood of post-war houses, low-rise complexes and older apartment buildings, with employment land around it. Birchmount and Lawrence has been a quiet corner, but that is changing.

In 2023, Shelborne Capital applied to build two towers of 21 and 24 storeys with 526 homes on a shared podium at 2157 Lawrence Avenue East, the southeast corner of the intersection, according to UrbanToronto. The same report noted Birchmount Green, a 15-storey building on the west side of Birchmount, and more tower proposals further east along Lawrence.

For an owner here, that means more construction traffic for a few years and more people and retail at the corner afterwards. The Line 2 extension is planned to add a station at Lawrence and McCowan, east of here, around 2030. The data panel on this page shows today’s transit options from the door.

Pricing a complex that almost never trades

With twelve homes, there may be no sales at all in a given year. One home was listed for sale when I checked and none for rent. I don’t quote a single listing’s price or fee, and one listing is not a market anyway.

Condos.ca does not publish an average price per square foot for the complex. To price a home here, I would start with any past sales inside YCC-153, then widen to similar 1970s condo townhouses in Dorset Park and Wexford, adjusting for the garage, the basement finish and whether the heat has been upgraded. A freehold townhouse nearby is the ceiling, not the comparable.

Request my building sold report for what has actually traded here, and read it with the reserve fund study open beside it.

Building specifications

Amenities at 1185 Birchmount Road Townhouses

There is nothing shared to run here: no pool, no clubhouse, no gym. Your amenities are your own garage, basement and outdoor space, plus the fact that barbecues are allowed, which is not a given in condo townhouses. That keeps the fee focused on insurance and the buildings themselves.

Jatin’s honest take on 1185 Birchmount Road Townhouses

1185 Birchmount Road Townhouses — frequently asked questions

Looking at Agincourt, L’Amoreaux, Milliken, Dorset Park and Wexford in Scarborough more broadly? Start with my Toronto community guide — the neighbourhoods, what each pocket is like, and how they compare.