157 Madison Ave: A Four-Suite, Self-Managed Annex Condo With All-In Fees

157 Madison Avenue is a condominium with four suites. Four. It is run by the people who live there, it has been registered since 1984, and its fee covers almost every utility you would normally pay yourself. For the right buyer it is one of the quietest ways to own on one of the Annex’s best streets, and for the wrong buyer it is a headache. I’m Jatin Dua, RE/MAX Quantum Realty.

A condominium the size of a house

Madison Avenue runs north from Bloor Street through the heart of the Annex, and it is lined with the large brick houses the neighbourhood is known for. Part of the street sits within a Heritage Conservation District, which is a big reason it still looks the way it does.

157 Madison is a small three-storey building on that street, with four condominium suites. In practice that means each owner holds a home roughly the size of one floor of a big Annex house, with a few neighbours instead of a few hundred.

That scale is the whole point. There is no lobby, no concierge, no amenity floor and no elevator listed. You get a front door on a residential street, a handful of neighbours you will know by name, and a building that is far more like a converted house than a condo tower.

Self-managed: four owners, one corporation

MTCC-632 has no property management company. The four owners run it themselves, which means they hire the trades, pay the insurance, keep the books, set the fee and look after the reserve fund.

With four households, this can be easy and cheap. Decisions are made at a kitchen table, not a board meeting. It can also stall if owners disagree, or if the one owner who does all the work sells. There is no buffer, and every vote matters.

Before you buy, ask your lawyer to review the status certificate in full, along with the reserve fund study, the last few years of financial statements and any minutes of owners’ meetings. Ask plainly who does the administration today, and how it will be handled if that person leaves.

The fee covers almost everything

The fee inclusions here are unusually complete. Air conditioning, heat, hydro, water, building insurance and parking are all listed as covered, along with the common elements. Most condominiums leave hydro on your own meter, and many charge separately for parking.

That has two sides. For an owner, it makes monthly costs predictable: your winter and summer bills do not swing. It also means you share utility costs with three other households, so ask how usage is split, whether there are separate meters, and how the fee has changed over the last few years as energy prices rose.

Parking is included, which matters on a street of older houses where many homes have little or no off-street parking. An assigned space in the Annex is a real asset. Confirm exactly what comes with the suite you are looking at, and whether it is exclusive-use or shared.

One more point on the all-in fee: when you compare this building with a larger condo nearby, add the hydro, cooling and parking costs back onto the other building’s fee. The gap is often smaller than the headline numbers suggest.

Daily life between Bloor and Dupont

You are a short walk from the cafes, bookshops and restaurants of Bloor Street, and from the University of Toronto campus. Dupont Street sits at the north end of Madison. The data panel on this page covers transit, schools, food and parks.

As a 1984 condominium on a street of much older houses, it sits in the middle: you get a newer structure than the Victorians around you, but nothing like the construction standards of a building from the last decade. Sound transfer between suites, window performance and insulation are worth checking in person, ideally with a home inspector who knows small condominiums.

Madison is a quiet residential street with mature trees, so expect a calm setting and a lot of students and families around. If you are looking at nearby options of a similar scale, Madison Avenue Lofts and South Hill on Madison are the other condominiums on the street, and they are worth comparing for size and fees.

Pricing: there is no building average to lean on

There were no suites for sale or for rent here when I checked, and there is no building average price per square foot to quote. With four units, a sale may happen once every few years, and one sale is not a market.

To value a suite, I would compare it with recent sales of similar-sized condos in small Annex buildings, then with house-converted apartments and townhouses on nearby streets, and adjust for the all-inclusive fee and the parking space. Because hydro, heat and air conditioning are in the fee, compare total monthly cost, not the fee alone.

Resale buyers in a building this small are a narrow group, and that cuts both ways. When you buy, you may face little competition. When you sell, you may need patience, because the next buyer has to be comfortable with self-management and a four-suite corporation too.

Expect your lender to ask questions. Some lenders look harder at very small, self-managed corporations, so speak to your mortgage broker before you make an offer. If you want to see how the area has been trading, my building sold report is a good starting point.

Building specifications

Amenities at 157 Madison Avenue Condos

There is no amenity package in the usual sense. Bike storage and permission to barbecue are the practical extras, and the security system is the main shared feature. You are buying a home, not a lifestyle building.

Jatin’s honest take on 157 Madison Avenue Condos

157 Madison Avenue Condos — frequently asked questions

Looking at Yorkville, the Annex and Midtown more broadly? Start with my Toronto community guide — the neighbourhoods, what each pocket is like, and how they compare.