Vancouver Rental Market Discussion

[Changing City]

"A legal challenge aimed at stopping a social housing project in Kitsilano has been dismissed by the BC Supreme Court.

This comes after the province passed Bill 26 in April, which made it easier for the City of Vancouver to move ahead with the 13 storey, 129 unit social housing building at Arbutus and West 7th, also known as the Arbutus project."

CityNews 1130

[giallo]

Fantastic news.

It takes a special kind of jerk to try to stop a social housing project near an upcoming rapid transit station. Again, a perfect reason why the province needed to get involved in municipal housing. The public will only look out for their best interests - misguided as they may be.

[SpongeG]

‘Perfect storm’ of market conditions threatens Vancouver rental projects: CMHC
Developers holding back or delaying projects, according to new report
By Claire Wilson | December 20, 2023

A “perfect storm” of market conditions is threatening the delivery of rental housing in Vancouver and across Canada, according to the Canada Mortgage and Housing Corp. (CMHC).

Rapidly rising interest rates, high construction and government fees, as well as taxes and levies have complicated the financial feasibility of new rental projects, states a Dec. 18 report commissioned by the crown corporation.

“Developers today are responding to a ‘perfect storm’ over the last three years in Canada – construction costs are up by over 50 per cent, conventional lending rates have more than doubled and government fees in markets such as Vancouver and Toronto have increased to over 25 per cent of construction budget costs,” said the CMHC’s report, which was authored by financial services firm Ernst & Young LLP (EY).

...

https://biv.com/article/2023/12/perf...-projects-cmhc

[whatnext]

I'm surprised this is just being reported on now. I've been hearing of this from friends who rent for a while:

Vancouver buildings crank up parking, storage fees to sidestep rent increase limit
Megan Devlin
Feb 9 2024

Some Vancouver tenants say they’re seeing massive increases to parking and other fees as buildings find ways to drive revenue despite the provincially-controlled limit on rent increases.

A tenant advocacy organization says it’s an increasingly common — and not always legal — strategy it has seen landlords take advantage of ever since the COVID-19-related rent freeze took effect in 2020.

“At that point, some unscrupulous landlords were looking for anywhere they could find an excuse to increase rent,” Robert Patterson, lawyer and tenant advocate with BC’s Tenant Resource & Advisory Centre (TRAC), told Daily Hive.

Residents of The Victoria, a Strand building in East Vancouver, tell Daily Hive their parking fees increased by 17% this year, following a 15% increase in 2023. Since the building opened in 2020, fees for a basic parking stall have risen from $100 per month to $135.

“It’s exhausting,” resident Ashley T. told Daily Hive. “It’s very, very unsettling and amps up the precarity of being a renter.”....

https://dailyhive.com/vancouver/park...ed-up-rent-cap

[GenWhy?]

Except they left out the only juicy and fact heavy part in the whole trash piece:

"Patterson said landlords typically argue that parking or storage is a separate agreement. But he said the Residential Tenancy Act includes parking as a service or facility the tenant gains access to by paying rent — and therefore should be covered under the act.

Within the last six months, TRAC helped one building win a dispute that prevented the landlord from raising a building’s parking fee."

This is news worthy and report on and they skipped the whole bit!

[whatnext]

Originally Posted by GenWhy?

Except they left out the only juicy and fact heavy part in the whole trash piece:

"Patterson said landlords typically argue that parking or storage is a separate agreement. But he said the Residential Tenancy Act includes parking as a service or facility the tenant gains access to by paying rent — and therefore should be covered under the act.

Within the last six months, TRAC helped one building win a dispute that prevented the landlord from raising a building’s parking fee."

This is news worthy and report on and they skipped the whole bit!

Interesting. I had always assumed rent controls covered the living unit only, not ancillary stuff. Sounds like there might be lots of landlords under that misapprehension as well.

[whatnext]

Good article in BIV on the state of rental market and investor-condos. Seems like banning STRs did some good:

In B.C., a glut of supply could ease affordability
David Hutniak, chief executive officer of the advocacy group Landlord BC, said they've seen a 'softening of rents, particularly at the higher end.'
Kerry Gold, The Globe and Mail
about 2 hours ago

In the B.C. housing market, there’s good news for renters and bad news for investors in the year ahead. There will be a continued lacklustre presale condo market which means investor-owners of condos will have to adjust their rents. As well, rents will continue to drop as new purpose-built rentals come online, say industry insiders.

Case in point: downtown Vancouver, particularly the luxury condo market, where investors try to get more than $6 per square foot rent for a unit.

“The rental return for our passive investors isn’t there any more downtown,” said real estate marketer and founder of the Rennie Group, Bob Rennie. So that’s hurting presales because [the] investors taking their family money and buying are 50 per cent plus of a building sale. So investors don’t see prices going up and investors see rents actually going down in the city.”

David Hutniak, chief executive officer of the advocacy group Landlord BC, said they’ve seen a “softening of rents, particularly at the higher end.” Landlords who catered to international students have been affected, due to the federal government reducing the numbers of foreign students. Some purpose-built rental building owners have offered incentives such as amenity bonuses, one-month free rent and gift cards to help fill suites...

....Property manager Debbie Rose, who works with Re/Max Penticton Realty, said their region has seen applications fall off and rents dip. Landlords are adjusting to a new reality, because the rental market is directly impacted by the downturn in the real estate market.

“Rentals we would have got 70 or 80 applications on, now we’re lucky if we’re getting 10,” said Ms. Rose. “A one-bedroom that would have easily rented out for $1,700 a year ago, we are probably getting offers of $1,550 or $1,600.”

She agrees that a big impact has been the province’s short-term rental regulations, which were designed to move short-term rental units to the long-term rental market. However, property owners are more likely to sell rather than rent to a long-term renter, she said. The reduced rents cannot cover their carrying costs.....

https://www.biv.com/news/real-estate...bility-9951830

[GenWhy?]

"“The rental return for our passive investors isn’t there any more downtown,” said real estate marketer and founder of the Rennie Group, Bob Rennie. So that’s hurting presales because [the] investors taking their family money and buying are 50 per cent plus of a building sale. So investors don’t see prices going up and investors see rents actually going down in the city.”"

Suck it, Bob

[whatnext]

Originally Posted by GenWhy?

"“The rental return for our passive investors isn’t there any more downtown,” said real estate marketer and founder of the Rennie Group, Bob Rennie. So that’s hurting presales because [the] investors taking their family money and buying are 50 per cent plus of a building sale. So investors don’t see prices going up and investors see rents actually going down in the city.”"

Suck it, Bob

Yup. He's pretty much the poster child for what the owner of Sutton Group is slamming in the article:

...Businessman Ross McCredie, owner of McCredie Investments, which recently purchased Sutton Group, said it’s likely the market will self-regulate and rents will drop further simply because of more supply. But he also sees residents moving away from the Lower Mainland and to more affordable, livable communities. He argues that the cost of living in Metro Vancouver is simply too high, from land values to the cost of insurance, and taking the ferry...

...Vancouver policy-makers need to consider who’s going to live in the communities they are planning for, where they are coming from, and whether we want the future generation to stay and lay down roots, he said. Density requires infrastructure.

“To my mind – and I have worked a lot around the world – I think of Vancouver as a resort market, and it’s getting so more and more. You are going to have people who are very wealthy, who have places here, [who] don’t care about property taxes [because] it is what it is. But for people who want to live and work here, young families, it will become more and more expensive; more difficult to justify.

“We have had policies in place in B.C. for the last 25 years where we simply didn’t care,” he said. “It was more about, just, ‘More and more – bring people in, especially wealthy people.’ And that drove our economy, that was the mandate. And I question the thought process on that....

[kikin]

Originally Posted by GenWhy?

Except they left out the only juicy and fact heavy part in the whole trash piece:

"Patterson said landlords typically argue that parking or storage is a separate agreement. But he said the Residential Tenancy Act includes parking as a service or facility the tenant gains access to by paying rent — and therefore should be covered under the act.

Within the last six months, TRAC helped one building win a dispute that prevented the landlord from raising a building’s parking fee."

This is news worthy and report on and they skipped the whole bit!

How is that a thing? In many buildings a lot of suites have no parking and the ones that do have parking sell for a premium of maybe $40,000 more. An owner might have their parking stall rented out separately and then decide to rent out the suite itself.

[whatnext]

Originally Posted by kikin

How is that a thing? In many buildings a lot of suites have no parking and the ones that do have parking sell for a premium of maybe $40,000 more. An owner might have their parking stall rented out separately and then decide to rent out the suite itself.

That applies to rentals in stratas but not purpose-built rental.

[SpongeG]

I've noticed that the rentals at Park Royal appear to have many empty units, is it a bad location? too expensive? no rentals needed anymore?

that said I've also noticed in recent weeks many buildings have For Rent signs or Vacancy signs, in the past that was rare to see so many rentals available.

[Alex Mackinnon]

Originally Posted by SpongeG

I've noticed that the rentals at Park Royal appear to have many empty units, is it a bad location? too expensive? no rentals needed anymore?

that said I've also noticed in recent weeks many buildings have For Rent signs or Vacancy signs, in the past that was rare to see so many rentals available.

There was a post on reddit a couple weeks back that called this building out for being overpriced, dirty and terribly managed. It also seems like a crap location, so that's a few headwinds.

[s211]

Originally Posted by SpongeG

I've noticed that the rentals at Park Royal appear to have many empty units, is it a bad location? too expensive? no rentals needed anymore?

that said I've also noticed in recent weeks many buildings have For Rent signs or Vacancy signs, in the past that was rare to see so many rentals available.

Is it possible they're on 1st nation land, and a ground lease is close to expiry?

[whatnext]

More good news on the housing front:

Metro Vancouver rental housing vacancy rate hits 30-year high amid new supply and sluggish demand
Kenneth Chan
Dec 17 2025, 1:05 pm

...According to a new report by Canada Mortgage and Housing Corporation (CMHC), the region’s secured purpose-built rental housing vacancy rate reached 3.7 per cent in 2025. This is well above CMHC’s projections of a vacancy rate of between 2.1 per cent and 2.4 per cent.

It is also a one-year steep increase from the 1.6 per cent vacancy rate in 2024, and below one per cent in 2023, 2022, and before the pandemic...

....While rental housing demand has been supported in parts of the downtown Vancouver peninsula by return-to-office and hybrid work policies, vacancies across much of the region have climbed to or exceeded previous highs. Downtown Vancouver continues to perform relatively better than other areas, with vacancy rates remaining below pandemic-era peaks. However, in many neighbourhoods outside the city centre, renters are finding more choice than they have had in years.....

https://dailyhive.com/vancouver/metr...25-record-high

[jollyburger]

Originally Posted by s211

Is it possible they're on 1st nation land, and a ground lease is close to expiry?

The new rental towers aren't on reserve land. The mall land (and the old rental towers) don't expire until 2073.

[whatnext]

I've argued before that BC needs much more government owned housing and its exactly to weaken the power of shitbag landlords like this one:

A Vancouver Landlord Keeps Being Allowed to Evict Tenants. Why?
Residents want to know why BC’s Residential Tenancy Branch keeps siding with Plan A.
Jen St. Denis 5 Dec 2025

One morning in July 2024, Jon Petrov heard a knock on his door. It was a police officer, there to tell Petrov his landlord had made a report accusing him of theft.

What had Petrov stolen? According to his landlord — a company called Plan A — Petrov had taken several paintings and prints from the building’s laundry room, a space where residents regularly traded books, housewares and other belongings. Over the years, people had hung various pieces of art on the walls, some made by tenants who lived in the building....

...Plan A has a reputation in the West End. If you Google the name of the company and its director, Anoop Majithia, you’ll find articles from 2014, when the company raised laundry rates at one building to $13.50 a load, and then tried to evict a married couple on the grounds that the husband was “an illegal tenant.” Other tenants said they were peppered with constant eviction notices.

In 2022, Plan A was fined $10,000 by B.C.’s Residential Tenancy Branch, after branch inspectors found the company had violated the Residential Tenancy Act in 152 leases. There are also multiple news stories about new tenants signing leases based on photos that allegedly didn’t actually show the unit they were moving into.

Plan A bought Park Beach (1925 Nelson St.) in 2023. Soon, tenants started to get eviction notices.

In 2024, Park Beach tenant Paula Payot was surveilled, with a camera pointed at her apartment door, so the landlord could prove that her boyfriend was visiting too often and evict her. Before a Residential Tenancy Branch hearing, she was presented with evidence that shocked her: Plan A had also hired a private investigator to watch Payot and her boyfriend. The RTB ended up ruling against the landlord, saying there was nothing in Payot’s lease that prevented or limited overnight visits from guests....

https://thetyee.ca/News/2025/12/05/V...Evict-Tenants/

[whatnext]

More fallout from Eby's budget:

'Catastrophic' decision to scrap affordable rental program leaves projects in limbo
Non-profits applying for the Community Housing Fund have been told their applications are on hold
Katie DeRosa · CBC News · Posted: Feb 18, 2026

A water-logged piece of land on East Pender Street was once the site of a low-rise apartment building. It was torn down in 2020 to make way for a 64-unit affordable housing project spearheaded by the Co-operative Housing Federation’s development branch.

Now, it's now the symbol of a broken promise by the province, one that puts thousands of affordable rental units in jeopardy, say some non-profit housing providers.

The province announced it is "reallocating" nearly $1.4-billion worth of housing investments, including pausing any funding through the Community Housing Fund....


....The impact on affordable housing is "catastrophic," said Thom Armstrong, CEO of the Co-operative Housing Federation of B.C.

"There are thousands of units in the hopper that were submitted as proposals in response to the Community Housing Fund call [for proposals]. Those developments have been occupying people's time, attention and money on the assumption the call would be proceeding. And to find out now that they're not is so incredibly disappointing."

Armstrong said the financial backers of the East Pender Street project — the Community Land Trust, which is the federation's development arm, and a private development company — had already invested $2 million to get the project's shovels ready. Now, those costs can't be recouped and there's no reliable government partner willing to fund it, Armstrong said....

https://www.cbc.ca/news/canada/briti...-b-c-9.7096640