NoTankYou.ca
An Ontario
homeowner-to-
homeowner
public service
announcement

Read this before your next utility bill

No,
tank you.

Across Ontario, homeowners pay $25–$45 a month, forever, to rent a hot water tank they could own outright for about a thousand dollars. Many don't even know they're renting. Here's how the scheme works — and how simple it is to walk away.

Do the math How to get out
$25–$45typical monthly rental fee
$6,48018 years of rent at $30/mo
≈ $1,050buy + install your own tank
10–15 yrstypical tank lifespan
№ 01

The scheme, explained

A hot water tank is one of the simplest appliances in your home. It's a metal cylinder with a burner or an element. It has no moving parts to speak of. A good one costs $700 to $1,200 at any big-box or plumbing supply store.

Rental companies have built an industry around charging you monthly — indefinitely — for that cylinder. The fee rides quietly inside your utility bill, often for decades. Rates typically escalate every year. And when the contract or the tank finally expires, the exit is engineered to funnel you into… another rental.

The most troubling part: many homeowners don't know they're renting at all. Rental contracts routinely transfer with a house when it's sold. People live in a home for years — sometimes decades — believing they own the tank in their basement, while a line item on their bill quietly collects hundreds of dollars a year.

Over a tank's lifetime, a renter can pay five to eight times what the equipment is worth. That's not a service. That's a subscription to your own basement.

Check today

You may already be renting

Pull up your latest utility or billing statement and look for a "water heater rental," "HWT," or "rental equipment" line. If it's there, you're paying rent — whether or not you ever signed anything.

The model

The fee never ends

There's no finish line. No equity. No point at which the tank becomes yours. Every year the rate can tick up, and every payment buys you exactly what last month's payment did: nothing.

The catch

Exit is made difficult

Buyout schedules that never favour you, return depots, paperwork, termination fees, and retention agents trained to keep you on the books. Difficulty leaving is not a bug — it's the business model.

№ 02

Do the math

What has renting cost you?

$6,480paid in rent
$1,050to own instead*
You'd have overpaid by $5,430 — enough to buy 5 brand-new tanks.

* Estimate: ~$750 tank + ~$300 basic install. Your quote may vary — ask a local plumber. Rental escalation clauses mean real totals are usually higher than this.

№ 03

One homeowner's story

For eighteen years, one Ontario homeowner paid for a hot water tank they were certain they owned. The fee sat quietly inside the utility bill, month after month. They only found out the truth when a billing-change notice arrived in the mail — their "tank rental" would now be billed directly by the rental company.

Years 1–18

The quiet fee

Roughly $25–$35 a month, buried in the bill. Nobody ever asked them to sign anything. Nobody ever told them they were renting. Over those years the fee added up to thousands of dollars — for a tank worth a fraction of that.

The letter

The discovery

A routine notice about a billing change was the first time they learned the tank wasn't theirs. Eighteen years in their own home, and the water heater in the basement belonged to a company they'd never knowingly done business with.

The failure

The pressure play

When the tank eventually failed, the rental company sent a contractor. Mid-visit, the contractor put the homeowner on the phone with an agent who pushed them to verbally agree to a brand-new multi-year contract, on the spot. They asked for a PDF they could read and sign instead. The agent got hostile. That was all they needed to know. They sent the contractor away.

The exit

One call to a plumber

Their local plumber recommended a tank from a big-box store — about $750 — and installed it for about $300. Hot water was flowing again within days. Two years on, it has run flawlessly, with a decade or more of service still ahead of it.

The aftermath

The paperwork fight

The rental bills kept coming anyway, then escalated to collections pressure — a common story when people leave. It's why the exit steps below insist on one thing: cancel in writing, return the equipment by the book, and keep records of everything.

"I wasn't willing to verbally agree to a contract over the phone. The moment they got hostile about putting it in writing, I knew everything I needed to know."

№ 04

Know the tactics

Rental operators — as an industry — rely on a familiar playbook. None of it survives contact with an informed homeowner. Learn these six moves and you're immune to most of them.

1

The verbal contract

An agent asks you to "confirm" or "agree" on a recorded phone call — which can bind you to a multi-year term. Never agree to anything by phone. Demand the full contract in writing, read it, and take your time.

2

Hostility on request

Ask for paperwork and watch the tone change. Pressure, urgency, and irritation when you request written terms is the clearest red flag there is. A fair deal survives being read.

3

The buried fee

Rental charges hide inside utility bills as innocuous line items, and contracts transfer silently when homes change hands. The scheme depends on you never looking closely.

4

Buyout arithmetic

Ask to buy your rented tank and the quoted price is often startling — sometimes more than a brand-new unit, for equipment that's years old. The schedule is designed to make staying feel easier.

5

The doorstep deal

Unsolicited door-to-door sales of water heaters were banned in Ontario in 2018 precisely because of this industry's tactics. If someone shows up at your door about your water heater, the law is on your side: don't sign, don't "verify your account," don't let them at your tank.

6

The exit gauntlet

Termination fees, return depots, drawn-out phone trees, offshore call centres with no authority to resolve anything, and collections pressure on disputed accounts. Expect friction on the way out — then document your way through it.

№ 05

The way out

Owning your hot water is a one-week project and a one-time bill. Here's the whole playbook.

Read your bill

Find the rental line item on your utility or billing statement. Note the monthly amount and how long you've likely been paying it. That number is your motivation for the rest of this list.

Get your contract — in writing

Request a copy of whatever agreement supposedly covers your tank, plus the exit and buyout terms. Everything in writing, always. If you just bought a home, ask your real estate lawyer whether a rental contract was assumed in the purchase.

Call a local plumber

Not a national brand. A local, licensed plumber — the kind whose number stays on your fridge for the next twenty years. Ask for a quote to supply and install an owned tank. Many will pick the tank up for you.

Buy your own tank

A quality 40–50 gallon gas or electric tank runs about $700–$1,200 retail and typically carries a 6–12 year manufacturer warranty. Installation is usually $300–$500. Paid once. Done.

Cancel by the book

Give the rental company written notice. Return or make the old tank available exactly as the contract requires, and get written confirmation that the account is closed. Photograph the tank and keep every receipt, email, and reference number. If they keep billing you, dispute it in writing and escalate to Consumer Protection Ontario — don't rely on phone calls that leave no trace.

Know your rights

Ontario consumer protection law gives you cooling-off periods on many agreements, banned unsolicited door-to-door water heater sales in 2018, and in 2024 banned the notices of security interest (NOSIs) that some equipment lessors registered against homes. See the resources below.

The whole philosophy, in one sentence:

Instead of renting from a call centre you'll never meet, build a relationship with one local plumber — someone who'll recommend the right tank, install it in an afternoon, and answer the phone in ten years when you finally need them again.

№ 06

Where to buy, who to call

No trade licence required, no secret catalogue. The tank is on a shelf twenty minutes from your house, and the right installer is probably already working on your street.

Part A — The equipment

Where to buy your tank

  • Big-box home stores. Home Depot, Rona, Lowe's and Canadian Tire all stock 40–50 gallon gas and electric tanks from makers like Rheem, John Wood and Giant — roughly $600–$1,200, often available same day or delivered within the week.
  • Or let your plumber supply it. Plumbers buy from trade wholesalers, often below retail, and handle the warranty registration. Ask for a "supply and install" quote and compare it against buying the tank yourself.
  • Match what you have. Note your current tank's fuel (gas or electric), venting style (a gas tank vents up a flue or out the wall with a fan), capacity, and physical size. Snap a photo of the old tank's label — your plumber or the store can decode it.
  • Size by household. 40 gallons suits 2–3 people; 50 gallons suits 4+. Bigger isn't better — it's just more water kept hot around the clock.
  • Check the warranty. Tanks come with 6-, 9- or 12-year manufacturer warranties. Register it, staple the receipt to the manual, and you're covered for most of the tank's working life.
Part B — The human

How to find a local plumber

  • Ask your street before the internet. Neighbours, a community Facebook group, or the counter at the local hardware store will surface the same two or three names — that consensus is worth more than any ad.
  • Verify the credentials. Plumbing is a licensed trade in Ontario, and if your tank is gas, the person connecting it must be a TSSA-registered gas technician. Ask directly — good pros expect the question and answer it happily.
  • Favour small and established. A local outfit that's been around ten years answers its own phone and wants your next twenty years of faucets, leaks, and renos. That's the whole point.
  • Get it in writing. A written quote for the full job — tank (if supplied), installation, haul-away of the old unit. Typical installation runs $300–$500. Two or three quotes if you have the time; one trusted referral if you don't.
  • Keep the number. When the job's done, put their magnet on the fridge. Congratulations: you now have what the rental companies were pretending to sell you — someone to call.

Five questions to ask any installer

  1. Are you licensed — and TSSA-registered for gas, if my tank is gas?
  2. Can you supply the tank, or should I buy it myself — and what does each cost?
  3. Will you haul away the old tank — or handle returning a rental unit to its depot?
  4. What's your warranty on the installation labour?
  5. Can I get the total in writing before work starts?

Clip, screenshot, or just read it off your phone — anyone worth hiring passes all five.

House rule

If anyone in this process — a store, an installer, a voice on the phone — steers you toward a monthly payment instead of a price, you already know everything you need to. Walk away.

№ 07

Resources

Consumer Protection Ontario

Your rights under Ontario's Consumer Protection Act — contracts, cooling-off periods, and unfair practices.

→

File a consumer complaint

Being billed for a service you cancelled, or pressured into an agreement? File a complaint with the Ministry of Public and Business Service Delivery.

→

Door-to-door sales rules

Ontario's 2018 ban on unsolicited door-to-door sales of water heaters and other home comfort equipment — and what sellers are still allowed to do.

→

The Consumer Protection Act, 2002

The legislation itself, including remedies for unfair practices and rules for remote and direct agreements.

→
№ 08

Fair questions

Is renting a hot water tank illegal?

No. Renting is perfectly legal, and for a small number of people — say, a landlord who wants zero involvement — it might even make sense. The problem isn't the existence of rentals. It's the opacity, the lifetime cost, the inherited contracts nobody signed, and the pressure tactics used to keep people paying. This site exists so you can make the choice with the numbers in front of you.

But the rental includes maintenance and repairs…

Hot water tanks need almost no maintenance. Most owners never service one between install and replacement. Even a worst-case service call — a thermostat, a valve, an element — usually costs less than a single year of rent. And when an owned tank finally dies of old age, replacing the whole thing costs less than a few years of rental fees.

What if my tank breaks and I own it?

You call your plumber — the same one who installed it. Manufacturer warranties on new tanks typically run 6–12 years on the tank itself. Compare that timeline to what rent would cost over the same years, and "who fixes it" stops being a scary question.

Should I get a tankless unit instead?

Maybe! Tankless units cost more upfront but save space and can save energy. The advice is the same either way: own it, don't rent it, and let a local plumber you trust size it for your home.

I just bought a house. Am I renting a tank without knowing it?

Very possibly — rental contracts commonly transfer with the property. Check every line of your utility bills, ask your real estate lawyer whether any equipment contracts were assumed on closing, and if you find one, ask the company for the full written agreement before deciding what to do.

Who runs this site?

An Ontario homeowner who spent 18 years unknowingly renting a tank, got the hard sell on the phone when it failed, and got out with one call to a local plumber. No ads, no sponsors, no affiliation with any company — and no interest in naming any. The problem is the model, not one logo.