Executive Summary: Key Legal and Evidentiary Issues

• Scope of a divided co-ownership syndicate’s powers to reconfigure outdoor parking spaces without infringing a co-owner’s exclusive use rights tied to their deed of acquisition.
• Tension between rights arising from the declaration of co-ownership and rights claimed under an individual purchaser’s notarial deed regarding the number and surface area of parking spaces.
• Procedural threshold for retracting a default judgment under article 346 C.p.c., including whether a good-faith misunderstanding of procedural steps constitutes a “cause judged sufficient.”
• Need to notify and possibly implead other co-owners whose parking rights and enjoyment of common portions are directly affected by a declaratory judgment reallocating parking.
• Evaluation of whether the syndicate’s defences, grounded in the declaration of co-ownership and common portions, are sufficiently serious and prima facie to justify retraction of the default judgment.
• Determination that retraction of the earlier default judgment is warranted and that the Syndicat de copropriété Maxplus, as successful party on the retraction motion, is entitled to costs, although no specific monetary amount is stated.

Factual background of the co-ownership dispute

The case arises from a condominium (copropriété divise) located at 601, boulevard Iberville, in Repentigny, Quebec, composed of nine private units. In 2015, 9327-1609 Québec inc. (the plaintiff) purchased unit 107. Its relative value and share in the common portions was set at 11.55%, and this share included the right of exclusive use to seven outdoor parking spaces, identified on a non-official plan annexed to the acquisition documents. Originally, the exterior parking layout suggested approximately 37 spaces. The plaintiff’s seven spaces included four perpendicular stalls along one property line and three parallel stalls along another boundary, reflecting both a specific number of spaces and an implicit surface area it claimed to have acquired.

Reconfiguration of parking and alleged prejudice

In time, the Syndicat de copropriété Maxplus (the defendant syndicate) created an ad hoc committee to reconfigure the parking layout. The committee proposed changing the orientation of numerous stalls to oblique parking, with the stated objective of increasing the total number of spaces from about 37 to 55. Although the plaintiff continued to be attributed seven spaces under this reconfiguration, it claimed that the new layout substantially reduced the total surface area of the spaces it effectively enjoyed compared to what it believed it had acquired in 2015. To address this perceived loss, the plaintiff proposed that it be attributed the equivalent of 9.1 parking spaces. This figure was based on a calculation that sought to preserve the initial surface area, take into account the alleged non-compliance of some spaces with municipal regulations, and exclude certain stalls designated for disabled persons. Alongside the physical reallocation, the plaintiff also argued that a new schedule for the apportionment of snow removal expenses among the units was required, tied to the revised distribution of parking spaces.

The declaratory judgment sought by the plaintiff

To resolve what it characterized as a “real difficulty” arising from divergent interpretations of how parking rights and snow removal costs should be allocated, the plaintiff instituted an action for a declaratory judgment. In its introductory motion, it asked the Superior Court to confirm that the allocation of all available parking spaces to the private units was valid as shown on a specific allocation table, and to declare that the distribution of snow removal costs for each unit conformed to a separate detailed table. The plaintiff framed the matter as a clarification exercise to resolve disputes over interpretation of the co-ownership configuration, including the impacts of the post-acquisition reconfiguration of parking. However, the substance of its position went beyond mere interpretation: the plaintiff effectively sought recognition of an exclusive enjoyment of a surface area of parking equivalent to more than the seven original stalls by converting a share of common portions into what it treated as quasi-private parking use.

The default judgment and the motion for retraction

The declaratory action led to a default judgment on 11 September 2025, after the defendant failed to respond to the proceeding. That judgment granted the full conclusions of the plaintiff’s motion, accepting its proposed parking allocation and apportionment of snow removal costs. The Syndicat later applied for retraction of this default judgment under article 346 of the Code of Civil Procedure, asserting that it had been prevented from defending itself by a sufficient cause, and setting out its substantive defences to the merits. The president of the Syndicat, Mr. Pierre-Luc Miron, explained that the introductory motion had been sent to him by email by the defendant’s accounting officer, who had been validly served. He read the motion but mistakenly believed that no immediate action was required and that he would later receive a notice indicating a hearing date. Having no experience with court procedures, he misunderstood that a written contestation had to be promptly filed. The record also showed that the parties had been exchanging extensive correspondence since May 2023 about the parking issue, and that a January 2025 email suggested a “final version” of the parking layout had been validated with the co-owners. The court noted that the action was served only about two months after that correspondence, in a context of ongoing dialogue.

Court’s analysis of sufficient cause for retraction

The court first examined whether there was a “cause judged sufficient” to justify retraction under article 346 C.p.c., given that the defendant did not allege fraud or surprise. The judge highlighted the tension between two fundamental principles: the stability and irrevocability of judgments, and the equally important right of the parties to be heard. In the context of default judgments, the Court of Appeal has emphasized that the need to correct errors, where possible without unfair prejudice to the other side, may justify setting aside a default judgment. Here, the judge found that the Syndicat had consistently opposed the plaintiff’s claims throughout the pre-litigation period and had never waived its rights. The president’s misunderstanding that the next procedural step would be receipt of a hearing notice was characterized as a good-faith mistake, one that could be corrected without depriving the plaintiff of any substantive right. The court added a further ground for retraction based on the need to hear all persons whose rights are directly affected by the requested measure. Under article 1039 of the Civil Code of Québec, a syndicate of co-owners is a legal person whose object includes conservation of the building, administration of common portions, and safeguarding the rights attached to the immovable and the co-ownership. When the plaintiff seeks a judgment that increases its parking at the expense of others, this directly reduces the number of spaces available to other co-owners. As a result, those other co-owners had a direct interest in the proceedings and should have been notified and, in the court’s view, impleaded. Article 477 C.p.c. requires that the syndicate notify the co-owners of such a claim within five days of service on the syndicate; this did not appear to have been done. This failure reinforced the conclusion that the default judgment should not stand without giving all affected parties an opportunity to be heard.

Assessment of prima facie defences

The court then assessed whether the Syndicat had advanced serious and sufficient defences to the plaintiff’s declaratory action. The plaintiff’s own motion acknowledged a genuine difficulty rooted in “divergences of interpretation” about the allocation and use of the parking spaces. In substance, the plaintiff sought to maintain the same parking surface area as before the reconfiguration and to transform that surface into an exclusive, quantified entitlement effectively equivalent to 9.1 spaces. This approach directly affected the rights of the other co-owners, whose ability to use the common parking would be correspondingly reduced. The Syndicat’s defences relied primarily on the declaration of co-ownership and the legal characterization of parking areas as common portions with rights of use, while the plaintiff anchored its claims in the wording of its individual title of acquisition. The Syndicat argued that the plaintiff was, in effect, appropriating a portion of the common areas and unilaterally converting them into privative portions to which it would have exclusive enjoyment. The court considered this a serious and credible line of defence that went beyond a minor interpretive disagreement. It cited appellate authority explaining that, in the context of retraction, the reasons for the default (the “rescinding” element) and the strength of the defences (the “rescissory” element) are interconnected “communicating vessels”: the more substantial and plausible the defences, the more acceptable and understandable a defendant’s explanation for its default may be, even if the error was careless yet sincere. Given the Syndicat’s reliance on the co-ownership declaration and its objection to the plaintiff’s attempt to enlarge its effective exclusive enjoyment of common parking areas, the court found the threshold of a serious prima facie defence was clearly met.

Outcome and implications for the parties

In the result, the Superior Court granted the Syndicat de copropriété Maxplus’s motion for retraction of judgment, set aside the default judgment rendered on 11 September 2025, and awarded costs in favor of the Syndicat. The decision effectively resets the litigation to allow a full contestation on the merits, with all affected co-owners to be properly informed and potentially joined, so that the court can later determine, in a fully adversarial setting, how the parking spaces and related snow removal costs should lawfully be allocated under the declaration of co-ownership and applicable law. The successful party in this retraction judgment is therefore the defendant, Syndicat de copropriété Maxplus, which obtained the retraction of the prior default judgment and an order for judicial costs in its favor; however, the decision does not specify any precise monetary amount for those costs or any damages, so the total monetary award in favor of the successful party cannot be determined from this judgment.