An ad near a Metro station in Hong Kong is offering to cover Ontario’s Foreign Buyers Tax for investors in Toronto condos, as seen here in this CityNews screen grab.

The ad also offers up to one year of rent guarantees for the first 30 buyers of units in a downtown condo building that has easy access to the underground PATH System and is close to Ryerson University.

Ontario’s Finance Minister Charles Sousa doesn’t see a problem.  He says as long as the tax is being collected, it doesn’t matter how sales are being promoted.  N.D.P. Leader Andrea Horwath says this kind of activity does nothing to cool Toronto’s red-hot real estate market.

Last month the Ontario government introduced a 15% cent non-resident speculation tax aimed at cooling down the market.  However, condo sales in the 416 area code saw an 8% cent gain in sales in April when overall GTA sales declined.

The Toronto developer says the ad came from a local third-party broker and while the ad featured a copy of the Menkes Developments logo, it was not authorized by the company.