Who gets paid first if multiple creditors have judgments against the same debtor in Ontario?

When multiple creditors have filed writs of seizure and sale against the same debtor and there are insufficient assets to satisfy everyone, Ontario's Creditors' Relief Act, 2010 governs how the proceeds are distributed. Unlike some jurisdictions where the first creditor to file a writ gets priority, Ontario takes a fundamentally different approach: it pro-rates enforcement proceeds among all creditors who have filed writs in the same county.

This means that if the sheriff sells a piece of the debtor's property and three creditors all have writs registered in that county, the net proceeds are shared proportionally among those three creditors based on the amount of their respective judgments — not based on who filed their writ first.

There is an exception: if a creditor has actually commenced and pursued active enforcement steps — such as delivering a writ to the sheriff with instructions to sell — before another creditor files, the initiating creditor may have some priority for the costs of their enforcement action. But the general rule is pro-rata sharing.

This pro-rata approach distinguishes Ontario from other provinces and has important strategic implications. A creditor with a large judgment relative to others benefits from the pro-rata system compared to a strict first-in-time system. Conversely, creditors cannot "race to the courthouse" and crowd out others. Being aware of this framework helps in planning enforcement strategy and assessing the realistic recovery where multiple creditors exist.