Garden Suites in Richmond Hill

To Richmond Hill. The application goes to the City of Richmond Hill Building Division, not York Region, as a new building on your lot with a drawing set of its own. The suite’s grading plan is part of that set. We draw the suite, file it and answer the examiner’s comments until the permit is issued.

Most of Richmond Hill is under the Toronto and Region Conservation Authority (TRCA). Oak Ridges and Lake Wilcox in the north drain to Lake Simcoe and are under the Lake Simcoe Region Conservation Authority. Either authority reviews a suite only where the lot falls inside its regulated area, near a valley, a watercourse, a wetland or a floodplain, and Ontario’s O. Reg. 41/24 counts building the suite as development activity for both. TRCA’s permit, where it applies, has to be in hand before the building permit is issued.

Richmond Hill permits up to three additional residential units on a lot in addition to the primary dwelling, as long as the lot has no more than four dwelling units in total and no more than two of the additional units are in an accessory residential building, such as above a detached garage. ARUs are subject to zoning requirements and restrictions, including a building permit, and the lot must be separately serviced by municipal sewage works and drinking water. A garden suite uses one of those three units, so the house can still take a basement unit.

Yes, at 15 cm across or more. Richmond Hill’s Tree Preservation By-law No. 19-25 (Municipal Code Chapter 1015) controls the removal and injury of trees on private property. A permit is required before removing or injuring any tree with a diameter at breast height of 15 cm or more, measured 1.4 metres above the ground. We plot every tree of that size from the survey when we place the suite.

Yes. We take on garden suites across Richmond Hill, including Oak Ridges and Mill Pond, about half an hour from our Richmond Hill office. The first consultation is free, by phone or on site.

Three things to start: property address and a survey, if you have one; whether the suite is for family or rent; and photos of the backyard and the side-yard access. Send those and we tell you what the City of Richmond Hill Building Division will ask for before we quote.

Not under By-law 143-24, which permits additional units, garden suites among them, only where the lot is served by municipal sewers and drinking water. Where those services are in place, the suite’s water, sewer and power still have to travel from the house to the back of the yard, and that route has to stay clear of trees the Tree Preservation By-law protects, so we plan it before the suite is placed.

Possibly, but a new building in the Gormley Heritage Conservation District, which covers Gormley’s village core under the Ontario Heritage Act, is something we take to the City before the design is settled. Outside the district, a Richmond Hill garden suite goes through the unit rules in By-law 143-24, the zoning check and the building permit.

Yes. By-law 143-24 treats a garden suite as an additional residential unit, and Ontario’s O. Reg. 299/19 lets anyone live in one, related to you or not, whether or not they own the lot. What makes it a legal rental is the building permit from the City of Richmond Hill Building Division and the final inspection that closes it, so we stay on the file until then.

CZBL 93-25, if your lot falls in the parts the Ontario Land Tribunal approved. Where an area is still under appeal, or a property sits outside the new by-law, the earlier zoning still applies, with its own setbacks, height limits and coverage. We work out which one governs your address and draw its limits on the survey, and By-law 143-24 then decides whether the suite can hold one unit or two.