How Long Do You Have to Bring an Unjust Enrichment Claim After a Common-Law Breakup in Ontario?

If your common-law relationship has ended and you believe you’re owed compensation for what you contributed, don’t assume you have unlimited time to act. Ontario law imposes limitation periods on civil claims, including unjust enrichment and joint family venture claims arising from a relationship breakdown — and figuring out exactly when your clock started running is often harder than people expect.

This article won’t give you a specific number of months or years, because doing so responsibly requires knowing the exact facts of your situation. What it will do is explain why timing matters so much, and what to do about it.

Why Timing Matters

Miss the applicable limitation period, and you can permanently lose the right to bring your claim — no matter how strong the underlying facts are. Courts generally have very limited ability, if any, to revive a claim once the relevant deadline has passed.

This is one of the areas of family-adjacent law where waiting to "figure things out" before getting advice carries real risk, separate from the emotional difficulty of a breakup.

What Starts the Clock

Ontario limitation periods generally use a "discovery" approach: the clock typically starts running when the claim was, or reasonably ought to have been, discovered — not necessarily on some fixed date tied to the relationship itself.

For a claim connected to a common-law breakup, that discovery date is often linked to separation, but it isn’t automatically the same for everyone. It can be affected by:

• When you actually knew, or reasonably should have known, that you had a potential claim
• Whether you and your former partner attempted to resolve things directly or through negotiation first
• Other case-specific facts about how and when the relationship truly ended

Because the applicable period and its starting point are fact-specific, this article deliberately doesn’t state an exact number — getting that wrong on your own could cause you to miss a real deadline, or wrongly assume you’ve already missed one when you haven’t.

Why You Shouldn’t Try to Calculate Your Own Deadline

Limitation periods can be paused, extended, or interpreted differently depending on the specific facts involved. Relying on a number you read online — including anywhere in this article — instead of getting advice tailored to your situation is a genuinely risky shortcut.

Common Situations That Complicate the Timing

• Ongoing settlement talks between former partners, which can affect when a claim is considered to have been "discovered"
• On-again, off-again relationships, where it isn’t immediately obvious which separation date the clock should run from
• Delayed discovery, where you only later learned the full significance of an asset or contribution — for example, discovering how much a property increased in value after you contributed labour or money to it

What to Do If You Think You Might Have a Claim

• [ ] Contact a family lawyer as soon as possible after separation — don’t wait to "see how things settle down" first
• [ ] Gather documentation now, while it’s still accessible: bank records, receipts, communications, and anything showing your contributions
• [ ] Don’t assume verbal agreements or informal understandings with your former partner extend your time to act
• [ ] Ask specifically about the limitation period that applies to your situation — don’t rely on general online information, including this article, for your actual deadline

Frequently asked questions