The Shannondale (née Electrohome, 152 Shanley St) | 8 fl | U/C

[ijmorlan]

Which makes no sense at all. A property cannot be sold for more than its worth to a bidder. So conceivably you could end up with an unsellable property, and indeed we might have such already.

I wonder what would happen if one were to expropriate a property with outstanding taxes. Could that work? Presumably the settlement would be set off against the taxes, so no actual payment would go to the former owner. Not a real estate lawyer, no idea how it actually works, just musing.

I'm no lawyer either, but I don't think the City has the legal footing to justify expropriation. It's a quandary, but I hope that something will get done with the lowered price and flexible zoning.

I’m not so sure. Toronto expropriated a bunch of buildings to build Dundas Square, a project which in no way had to be exactly where it is. Usually when I think of expropriation I think of something like a road, where they want to engineer the route of the road without worrying too much about who is going to be willing to sell. But at least some of the time it is clearly possible to do what we might call a “discretionary” expropriation. And obviously the current owner isn’t using the property, so I don’t think they can claim any sort of hardship or whatever. What if the City had a fully-owned development agency bid on the property auction? When I wish I ran into lawyers at parties more often…