Zenith Condos, 55 Skymark Dr: Big 1981 Suites With Almost Every Bill Paid

Zenith at 55 Skymark Drive is the building I point to when a buyer tells me they want house-sized rooms but are done with snow shovels and roofers. Every suite here starts at roughly 1,200 square feet, and the monthly fee covers nearly every utility you would otherwise pay yourself. The trade-off is a 1981 building, and you have to buy it with your eyes open. I’m Jatin Dua, RE/MAX Quantum Realty.

No small suites, and that is the whole point

Most towers going up in Toronto today are built around 500-square-foot one-bedrooms. Zenith goes the other way. The listed suite range starts at about 1,199 square feet and runs to roughly 1,946, so the smallest unit here is larger than many new two-bedroom-plus-dens.

With 230 suites spread over 24 floors, the building averages fewer than ten suites per floor. In practice that means shorter hallways, fewer neighbours sharing your elevator lobby, and suites that are laid out more like a bungalow stacked in the sky than a modern condo box.

If you are downsizing from a house and the furniture is coming with you, this is the kind of floor area that makes that realistic. A dining table that seats eight, a separate home office and real closet space are all normal here rather than a stretch.

Space like this also changes who your neighbours are. Large suites tend to attract owner-occupiers who stay for years, which usually shows up in a quieter building and in owners who care about how the corporation is run.

Because the building is more than four decades old, no two suites will be in the same condition. Some will have original kitchens and bathrooms; others will have been opened up and fully redone. When you compare listings here, compare the work that has been done as carefully as the square footage, because a dated suite and a renovated one can sit side by side at very different values.

A fee that replaces your utility bills

The monthly fee is the first thing buyers flinch at and the first thing I ask them to look at more closely. At Zenith it covers common elements, heat, hydro, central air conditioning, water, cable TV, building insurance and parking. Hydro inclusion in particular is uncommon; newer buildings almost always meter it separately.

So when you compare this fee to a newer building, add back what that building leaves out: an electricity bill for a 1,200-plus square foot suite, a cable package, a parking charge and, in some buildings, heating and cooling. The gap narrows a lot.

The flip side is that you have less control. Bulk utilities mean an unusually hot summer or a cold winter shows up in the corporation’s budget, and eventually in everyone’s fee. That is why the budget history matters more here than in a building where owners pay their own hydro.

Tennis and squash, from a different era of amenities

The amenity list reads like a 1980s club: a tennis court, a squash court, a sauna, a party room and a recreation room, with a security guard and a security system at the front. Courts were a standard selling point when this building went up and very few newer towers include them now, because they use land and do not show well in a sales centre.

For a player, an on-site court you can book without a club membership is a real perk. For everyone else, it is worth asking how often the courts are used and what they cost to keep up, because every owner contributes to that maintenance through the fee.

Life on Skymark Drive

Zenith is part of a cluster of towers along Skymark Drive in the Don Mills and Finch area, sharing the street with buildings such as The Elegance at 65 Skymark, Classic at 85 Skymark and The Excellence at 89 Skymark, with Skymark II on Finch Avenue East. It is an established high-rise pocket in a part of North York otherwise dominated by low-rise houses.

Daily life here is car-friendly: parking is in the fee and Highway 404 and the 401 are both easy drives. Transit, schools and walkability for the exact address are in the data panel on this page, and I would read those before deciding whether you could live here without a car.

What I like about a street like this is that the comparisons are right next door. Several towers of a similar era sit within a short walk of each other, so before you commit to Zenith you can see what the same money buys in its neighbours and judge fees, amenities and upkeep side by side. I always encourage buyers to do exactly that.

What Zenith costs per square foot

The building average sits around $531 per square foot. That is low for Toronto, and it reflects two things together: the age of the building and the high all-in fee, which the market prices into what buyers will pay up front.

The two suites currently for sale are asking between $825,000 and $1,170,000, and both list a monthly fee of about $1,350. Spread across the building’s size range, that works out to somewhere around $0.70 to $1.13 per square foot depending on the suite, before you credit back the hydro, heat, cable and parking it covers.

With only two listings active, there is not much choice at any one time. If you want a particular floor or exposure, expect to wait, and use the sales history in the panel above rather than any one asking price to judge value.

Building specifications

Amenities at Zenith Condos

This is a sports-and-social package rather than a spa or co-working one: courts, a sauna and rooms for gatherings, backed by staffed security. Confirm the full current list on a tour, since older buildings sometimes convert or close facilities over time.

Jatin’s honest take on Zenith Condos

Zenith Condos — frequently asked questions

Looking at the Junction, Corso Italia, Hillcrest Village and west-central Toronto more broadly? Start with my Toronto community guide — the neighbourhoods, what each pocket is like, and how they compare.