Jesta Group Starts $30 Million Toronto Condo Buying Spree
Jesta Group started its Toronto residential push with a $30 million bulk condominium acquisition, the opening move in a planned $500 million program. The Montreal-headquartered firm says it wants to target more than 1,000 units over the next 12 months, a pace that would turn scattered unsold inventory into a large institutional buying campaign.
Toronto Metropolitan University area
The first transaction centers on a recently completed building near Toronto Metropolitan University, and it was brokered by Jeff Lever, executive vice president at Cushman & Wakefield. Anthony O'Brien, senior managing director at Jesta Group, said, “Toronto's fundamentals remain strong and the current market environment has created a unique window to deploy capital at scale.”
$700 to $800 per square foot is the range Jesta is targeting for developer inventory, well below the $1,189 per square foot Urbanation Inc. recorded across the Toronto and Hamilton region in the first quarter of 2026. That gap helps explain why bulk deals are now possible: sellers facing softer demand have a narrower pricing band, while buyers can step in before units sit longer on the market.
Ontario HST rebate window
13% is the tax relief Jesta says helped make the first deal viable. O'Brien said the federal and provincial harmonized sales tax rebate was the catalyst, and that “without it, he said, the deal could still have closed, but would have required more protracted negotiations with the developer.” The rebate removes 13% in combined taxes for buyers of newly built homes intended for rental use, provided construction commenced before March 31, 2026.
$4.25 per square foot is the rent level Jesta plans to charge, which it says works out to roughly $2,125 per month on a 500-square-foot unit. That gives the company a clear rental thesis for inventory bought in bulk rather than sold one unit at a time, and it shows how the purchase price, tax treatment and rent target all have to line up for the strategy to work.
High Art Capital joins the market
$300 million was the size of High Art Capital’s launch earlier in 2026, when it emerged with backing from the province's Building Ontario Fund and agreements to buy unsold developer inventory for rental conversion. Its plan to raise another $1 billion in debt and equity puts Jesta’s move into a broader market pattern rather than a one-off trade.
March 31, 2027 is the cutoff for buyers to complete qualifying purchases before the rebate expires, which leaves a limited window for developers and institutional buyers to match inventory with rental demand. Jesta’s own pitch to developers is direct: “We are aggressively pursuing opportunities that fit this investment ethos and encourage developers with qualifying inventory to reach out directly.”
