Downsizing From a House to a Condo, Townhouse or Bungalow in Toronto

The short answer

Most Torontonians downsizing from a house to a condo or another smaller home end up choosing between four types: a condo apartment, a condo townhouse, a freehold townhouse or a bungalow. The sticker price is only part of the comparison. What you pay every month after closing, who fixes the roof and how many stairs sit between the front door and the bedroom all change with the type.

This post sets the four side by side using TRREB’s August 2026 figures for the City of Toronto. Our guide to downsizing in Toronto covers the rest of the move, from timing to sorting a house full of belongings.

What each home type sold for in Toronto, August 2026

TRREB’s Market Watch reports sales and prices by home type for the City of Toronto every month. These are the August 2026 numbers.

Home type, City of Toronto	Sales	Average price	Median price
Detached	550	$1,525,749	$1,170,000
Semi-detached	159	$1,110,639	$981,000
Freehold townhouse	45	$1,026,018	$962,000
Condo townhouse	120	$712,296	$661,650
Condo apartment	885	$651,648	$550,000

Source: TRREB Market Watch, August 2026, City of Toronto.

Three things are worth reading into this table and one thing is not. Condo apartments made up the largest group of sales that month, so a downsizer looking at apartments has the most choice. Freehold townhouses were the smallest group, with 45 sales across the whole city. The gap between the detached median and the condo apartment median was $620,000, which is the amount a typical move from one to the other could free up before costs.

What the table cannot tell you is the price of a particular street or building. Citywide medians mix downtown towers with suburban low-rise buildings and older bungalows with new infill houses. Our page on Toronto house prices tracks these figures over time and a valuation of your own home is a better starting number than any median.

Looking at a bungalow for sale in Toronto

A search for a bungalow for sale in Toronto turns up a mix of original post-war houses and renovated ones on the same kind of lot. TRREB does not report bungalows as their own category. They sit inside the detached figure, which in August 2026 had a median of $1,170,000 across 550 sales. That figure also includes two-storey and larger houses, so it is a reference point rather than a bungalow price.

What a bungalow offers is living space on one floor with no condo corporation. You keep a yard, a driveway and full control over what you change. You also keep every repair: the roof, the furnace, the windows, snow and the garden. For some downsizers that is the point. For others it is the very work they are moving to get away from.

If the house has a basement, single-level living also depends on where the laundry and storage are, so check that on every showing.

Downsizing from a house to a condo apartment

A condo apartment is usually the lowest priced of the four and, in August 2026, the most commonly sold. The trade is a monthly common expense fee in exchange for handing the building’s upkeep to the condo corporation.

The Condominium Authority of Ontario describes these fees as paying for the maintenance of the common elements, contributions to the reserve fund and services such as cleaning, building maintenance and condo management. The reserve fund is an account kept solely for major repairs and replacements of common elements and assets. A well funded reserve is what stands between an owner and a large one-time bill later.

That one-time bill has a name. A special assessment is an extra charge added to owners’ common expenses to cover a shortfall, which the CAO says can follow an unexpected equipment replacement, a budget that ran over or litigation. It is the main financial risk in condo ownership that a purchase price will not show you.

In a building with elevators, a condo apartment can put everything on one level from the parking garage to the bed. Check how the building handles move-ins, parking and visitor access before you commit, since those vary from one building to the next.

Condo townhouse or freehold townhouse

The two townhouse types look alike from the street and cost very different amounts. In August 2026 the median freehold townhouse in the City of Toronto sold for $962,000, while the median condo townhouse sold for $661,650.

A condo townhouse belongs to a condo corporation, so it carries a monthly fee and a reserve fund, the same as an apartment. What it usually adds is a front door at ground level. A freehold townhouse has no condo corporation, so there is no condo fee and every repair is the owner’s to arrange and pay for. Ask your lawyer to confirm whether any shared-cost arrangement applies to a particular townhouse before you firm up an offer.

Both types usually have stairs inside the unit. That makes them a different kind of downsize from a bungalow or an apartment, with less space but a similar layout to a house.

Both land transfer taxes on the smaller home

Buying in the City of Toronto means paying two land transfer taxes on the purchase: Ontario’s tax and the City’s municipal land transfer tax. Their brackets are the same up to $2,000,000, so at the prices most downsizers pay the two amounts match. First-time buyer refunds and rebates require that you have never owned a home, so a downsizer selling a house would normally pay both in full.

Home type, August 2026 median	Ontario tax	Toronto tax	Both taxes
Condo apartment, $550,000	$7,475	$7,475	$14,950
Condo townhouse, $661,650	$9,708	$9,708	$19,416
Freehold townhouse, $962,000	$15,715	$15,715	$31,430
Detached, including bungalows, $1,170,000	$19,875	$19,875	$39,750

At $550,000, each tax works out as 0.5% of the first $55,000, 1.0% of the next $195,000, 1.5% of the next $150,000 and 2.0% of the remaining $150,000, which is $275 plus $1,950 plus $2,250 plus $3,000. Run your own price through our Toronto land transfer tax calculator once you have a price range in mind.

The four types side by side

	Condo apartment	Condo townhouse	Freehold townhouse	Bungalow
Toronto median, August 2026	$550,000	$661,650	$962,000	Within detached, $1,170,000
Monthly condo fee	Yes	Yes	No	No
Reserve fund for major repairs	Yes	Yes	No, you save for repairs yourself	No, you save for repairs yourself
Exterior upkeep	Condo corporation	Condo corporation	Owner	Owner
Stairs inside the home	Usually none	Usually yes	Usually yes	Main floor living, check any basement
Status certificate to review	Yes	Yes	No	No

Treat the table as a list of questions to ask about a specific property. Individual buildings and houses break these patterns often.

Reading the status certificate before you buy a condo

For either condo type, the status certificate is the document that turns an unknown monthly cost into a known one. The CAO says it includes the declaration, by-laws and rules, the current budget, the latest audited financial statements, the state of the reserve fund, common expenses and arrears, any special assessments, insurance and any legal action involving the corporation. A corporation can charge up to $100 including taxes and must provide it within 10 days.

The CAO’s advice is that condo buyers should have their lawyers review it. Our guide to the condo status certificate in Toronto covers what your lawyer looks for.

What to do next

1. Get a realistic value for your current home, since the difference between its price and the next one sets your budget.
2. Decide whether you want to keep doing exterior maintenance yourself, because that single answer rules types in or out.
3. Price your target range through both land transfer taxes with the land transfer tax calculator.
4. For any condo, add the monthly fee to your budget and ask for the status certificate early.
5. Visit a few buildings or streets in person to check stairs, elevators and parking.

Our guide to what downsizing costs in Toronto adds up the other bills that come with the move. Nothing here is legal, tax or financial advice for your situation, so confirm the details with your lawyer or mortgage professional. When you want to compare types for your own move, contact us.