SID Developments in Sault Ste. Marie: What the Record Shows
The SID group of companies owned rental homes in Sault Ste. Marie, Ontario, when its property companies applied for court protection in January 2024. Local reporting covered contractors who were owed money, vacant homes and the later sale of the properties. This page sets out what the court record shows about each.
At filing in January 2024 the group's property companies had 201 rental units in Sault Ste. Marie, 122 of them occupied. By November 2024 the Monitor's count was 131 occupied of 200. Across the whole portfolio, the Monitor reported about $600,000 owing to third-party contractors, trades and service providers at filing. In January 2024 the companies asked the court for authority to pay suppliers and trades what they were owed from before the filing. Any such payment required the Monitor's consent.
The homes in Sault Ste. Marie
| Sault Ste. Marie rental units | January 2024 | November 2024 |
|---|---|---|
| Occupied | 122 | 131 |
| Unoccupied | 79 | 69 |
| Total | 201 | 200 |
Contractors, taxes and utilities
The Monitor's pre-filing report lists what the companies owed, apart from their lenders, when they applied for protection: "approximately $600,000 owing to third-party contractors, trades and service providers for goods and services provided to the Applicants", "approximately $1.9 million" of municipal property taxes, and "approximately $533,000 owing in respect of unpaid utilities". The figures are for the whole portfolio in all cities, not for Sault Ste. Marie alone. The same paragraph lists "approximately $203,000 owing to SID Renos in respect of unpaid management fees". SID Renos was the group's own renovation company.
For scale, the companies' filed response is that the companies in the CCAA alone spent about $13.6 million on renovations.
SooToday reported in early 2024 that local contractors in Sault Ste. Marie were owed an estimated $80,000.
In January 2024, days after filing, the companies asked for authority to pay trades and suppliers what they were owed from before the filing. The Monitor's first report records: "The Applicants are seeking authorization to make payments to certain suppliers integral to the continued operation of the Business in respect of obligations arising prior to the commencement of these CCAA proceedings." It notes that there are "a limited number of tradesmen or suppliers in these regions", and that "The business of these suppliers may be significantly impaired if certain pre-filing obligations are not promptly paid."
The same report states that in a CCAA proceeding such payments "should be a limited exception to the general rule prohibiting payment of prefiling obligations", and that the Monitor's consent was required before any pre-filing obligation was paid. Under the order of February 15, 2024 every payment by the companies required "the prior written consent of the Monitor". After the order of June 25, 2024 the Monitor controlled the companies' bank accounts.
The companies' filed response states that none of management generally took any salary or other compensation from the companies.
The companies applied for protection under the Companies' Creditors Arrangement Act on January 23, 2024. A CCAA proceeding is a court-supervised restructuring, not a bankruptcy. The Initial Order made that day stayed proceedings against the companies.
On July 30, 2026 the court made a Claims Procedure Order setting out how creditors file claims. The Monitor projects "approximately $800,000 not included in the Mortgaged Property Proceeds available for distribution to creditors".
Renovations
The Monitor's first report states that the companies' cash flow forecast showed a need for "funding of approximately $9 million, including approximately $6.4 million in one-time costs consisting of renovations and property tax arrears". The forecast to March 28, 2024 set out $3.0 million for renovations and $2.2 million for property tax arrears, and the report notes that "it is a condition of the DIP Facility that property tax arrears be paid current".
The Monitor's second report compares actual payments with that forecast for the eight weeks to March 22, 2024. Property tax arrears: $2,355,000 paid, against $2,200,000 forecast. Renovations: $53,000, against $2,625,000 forecast. Pre-filing arrears: $121,000, against $1,180,000 forecast.
Under the order of February 15, 2024 every payment by the companies required "the prior written consent of the Monitor". The companies' sworn evidence is that by June 20, 2024, $748,502.86 had been provided for renovations. Renovation funding in the proceeding.
What happened to the homes
Across the portfolio, 333 properties, about 82% of the total, went to secured lenders by credit bid, in exchange for their mortgage claims plus a cash allocation. The remaining properties were listed for sale. The sale and the buyers.
The Monitor's schedule of the 323 properties credit bid as of November 2024 lists 120 in Sault Ste. Marie. Its July 2026 status list for the 86 properties left after those credit bids shows 33 in Sault Ste. Marie: 24 sold, 3 closed by credit bid and 6 still listed, 2 of them with accepted offers. The counts are this site's tally of the two schedules.
The group's management company kept running the homes after the June 2024 order. A month later the Monitor reported that SID Management "is currently the property manager of the Portfolio", with a transition to a replacement manager expected to take 60 days.
The proceeding, side by side · Cost of the CCAA · The SooToday June 2024 article · The SooToday July 2024 article · Robby Clark and SID Developments
- Contractors, trades and service providers were owed about $600,000 when the companies filed, and municipal property taxes of about $1.9 million were unpaid. Pre-Filing Report of the Proposed Monitor (Jan 2024), s.3.2 para 5
- In November 2024, 69 of the 200 Sault Ste. Marie units were unoccupied. Tenth Report of the Monitor (Nov 29, 2024), s.2.0 para 2
- The Monitor expects principal claims on the promissory notes and mortgage deficiencies "to exceed $50 million", against the roughly $800,000 projected for those creditors. Fifteenth Report of the Monitor (Jul 21, 2026), s.6.0 para 5 and s.6.3 para 3(c)