Quick answer
You get out of an Enercare water heater rental by buying out the existing tank or by cancelling and returning it under your agreement. Ask Enercare for both figures in writing for your specific tank and install date, book the replacement before anything is disconnected, and check the next bill to confirm the account closed. If the rental came with the house, the original contract still applies.
An Enercare water heater rental ends one of two ways, and the order you do things in decides whether the house spends a night without hot water. The agreement on your account sets the terms, and agreements signed in different years do not read the same. Start by getting Enercare's numbers for your tank; everything else follows from them.
Enercare's exit routes: buyout versus cancel-and-return
A buyout means you pay Enercare a one-time amount, the tank stays where it is, and it becomes yours. That amount is not a flat fee. It is tied to the specific tank on your account: its type, its size and the date it was installed, so two neighbours with similar houses can be quoted very different figures. Request it for your address and ask for it in writing.
Cancel-and-return means the rental ends and the tank goes back to Enercare. Your agreement says what is charged for that and how the return has to happen. Before anyone puts a wrench on the tank, ask Enercare for the return instructions and for any return authorization number it requires. That number is what ties the returned tank to your account, and a tank that goes back without that link is how billing carries on after the heater is gone.
The sequence that avoids a day without hot water
- 1. Numbers first: get the buyout price and the cancel-and-return terms from Enercare, along with the return number if one is required.
- 2. Book the replacement: a new owned tank is $1,200–$2,500 installed, and the installer needs the old tank's size, fuel and venting type to bring the right one.
- 3. Licensed disconnect: on installation day a TSSA-licensed gas technician shuts off and disconnects the gas, drains the rental tank and sets the new one in its place.
- 4. Return or pickup: the old tank goes back the way Enercare specified, and you keep the receipt showing its serial number.
- 5. Confirm on the next bill: the rental line should be gone. Leave any pre-authorised payment in place until the final bill has cleared, then cancel it.
Done in that order, the old tank is still heating water on the morning of the swap and the new one is running by the afternoon. The mistakes run the other way: returning the tank before a replacement is booked, or installing a new heater and leaving the rental one in the garage with no return number while the charges continue.
What changes if the Enercare rental came with the house
Most people who ask this question did not sign the contract; they bought a house with the tank already in it. Enercare's own moving guidance says the seller stays responsible for the rental until the agreement is transferred or terminated, and that a transfer needs the equipment disclosed in the agreement of purchase and sale and an assumption agreement from the buyer. If your purchase agreement listed a rented water heater, you assumed that contract on closing.
- The original terms still apply. The install date, the rate history and the buyout schedule carried over to you; the clock did not restart on closing day.
- Ask Enercare for a copy of the agreement and the tank's install date. You are the account holder now and entitled to both.
- Check the title. Your lawyer's title search may show a registered notice from a rental company. Ontario stopped allowing those notices for consumer goods in June 2024 and treats the existing ones as expired, yet the rental contract behind the notice continues.
- Selling instead of buying? The disclosure and transfer steps are in our guide to selling a house with a rented water heater.
Is the Enercare tank worth keeping at all?
Sometimes the right exit is the buyout, and sometimes it is no exit yet. A rental tank that is only two or three years old may carry a buyout figure close to the cost of a new heater, and waiting changes that number. The comparison between renting and owning over the life of a tank is laid out in rent or buy a water heater in Ontario.
ZK Mechanical does the licensed disconnect and the new installation on the same day in Burlington, Oakville, Milton, Hamilton, Mississauga and Brampton, and leaves you with the paperwork to close the account. See how the rental buyout and replacement service works, browse the other water heater answers, or tell us what Enercare quoted you and we will price the alternative.