Public Open Houses to Resume in Ontario

Sellers can decide if they want an Open House or not.

The Ontario Government lifted the prohibition on in-person real estate open houses in York, Halton and Durham Regions last week as those regions entered Stage 3 of the provincial reopening. Peel Region and the City of Toronto are expected to follow suit shortly.

The Toronto Real Estate Board is still recommending that its member agents continue using alternative marketing strategies for sellers, such as virtual open house tours that can easily be accessed by buyers, and to conduct in-person open houses as a last resort. If directed by a seller to conduct an in-person open house during Stage 3, agents will be required to comply with all required government and public health and safety measures to ensure safe showings.

“While in-person open houses should be a last resort, the decision to hold an open house will be at the real estate brokerage level following all public health and safety protocols and subject to their client’s decision. The provincial State of Emergency was lifted on July 24th, and TRREB is therefore resuming the in-person open house property listing feed to public facing websites TRREB.ca, REALTOR.ca and the internal TRREB MLS System for those Regions that have entered Stage 3,” said Toronto Real Estate Board president John DiMichele.

It will take some time before we all get back to the way things were before Covid-19, although it does not seem like our real estate market has been adversely affected by the pandemic at all.