What is the difference between the Residential Tenancy Agreement and?
Theres a few different ways to look at this, depending on your context, but Ill try to keep this simple and short. A Residential Tenancy Agreement is a legal contract between a landlord and a tenant for a residential unit. Its a standardized form produced by the Ontario government and as of April 30th, 2018 it is the required form for all residential leases signed on or after that date. It is explicitly governed by the Residential Tenancies Act (2006), the law that covers residential rentals in Ontario. An agreement to lease is not specific legally defined form. In most cases, it likely just refers to an older form that was used for many residential leases, produced by the Ontario Real Estate Association. Many (possibly most) residential leases signed in Ontario in the last 20 or so year, but before April 20th, 2018, were done using this form. However, its worth noting that the term an agreement to lease has also been used for pre-lease forms (basically an application) as well as for commercial, industrial, machinery and many other leases.