number of empty, unsold condos continues to rise in metro vancouver — but a shift is coming
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a glut of unsold condos in surrey have forced developers and real estate agents to double-down on their efforts to move thousands of vacant stock, as seen at a development on king george boulevard on oct. 22, 2025.
jason payne
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the number of completed, empty and unsold condos and townhomes in metro vancouver continued to climb in the third quarter of 2025, according to new data.
but there are signs that this trend could start to taper off as developers pull more projects off the market or convert them into rentals.
“historically, most launched condo projects across metro vancouver have proceeded and were ultimately built to completion, so in previous years we could analyze inventory across all construction stages with almost full certainty that they would complete construction,” said jon bennest, vice-president of product development at zonda urban, which tracks real estate data.
“today, we are not fully certain of that, so we need to assess those numbers with the assumption that some actively selling projects today may not achieve their presale requirements and/or may be converted to rental in the future.”
zonda urban said tuesday that there were 3,745 empty and unsold condos and townhomes in metro vancouver at the end of the third quarter, up from 3,215 at the end of the second quarter, and 2,304 at the end of the first quarter. by comparison, the number of completed and unsold condos during the same period in 2019 was around 500.
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the third quarter, however, also saw a decline in the overall number of condos launched or released in metro vancouver by developers — units in the pre-construction phase to completed products.
there were 3,745 empty and unsold condos and townhomes in metro vancouver at the end of the third quarter.
jason payne
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at the end of the first quarter, the total inventory was 16,444. this went up again at the end of the second quarter to 16,589. but, by the end of the third quarter, the number fell to 14,998, according to bennest.
still, those numbers are relatively high compared to the 10-year average of 7,567.
some examples of projects that have been pulled include thind’s district northwest project in surrey, which was to have 933 units, and brivia’s curv project in downtown vancouver, which was to have around 500 units and is in receivership.
“the feasibility of presale condominium projects is, in some cases, being put into question. most notably, concrete, highrise projects that require significant presale adoption to get construction financing. these projects take a lot of time to get built so they inherently rely on investors who are ok with a longer completion timeline,” said bennest.
he added that costs haven’t come down enough to allow homebuilders to decrease pricing without losing money, so the result is more projects being shelved or converted to rental, where they can potentially get construction financing without pre-selling a certain number of units.
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there has been a lot of interest and scrutiny over the extent and momentum of the glut of unsold condos across metro vancouver, and if and how the development industry and government policy should react.
it comes as investors, who once were motivated to buy presale units because they expected the value of these to increase, are putting their cash elsewhere.
this is happening even though developers have been more focused on building condos that specifically appeal to investors’ desires for smaller layouts, which yield higher return-on-investment rates.
the result is a landscape of more empty and unsold units overall, especially in highrise, concrete buildings.
while there is definitely more choice in the market for prospective buyers of new condo units now, this might not be the case in three to five years as fewer of these projects will be built, said bennest.
for sellers watching projects get shelved or converted to rental, it’s a sign that, in some locations, it may take a while to get back to the demand and prices seen in 2021 and early 2022, he said. in order to be successful in selling units, owners have to understand their position in the market and price accordingly to attract buyers, he said.
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vancouver has been, and will likely continue to be, more expensive to rent in than in most other major canadian cities, but there are a growing number of purpose-built rental projects and some incentives for renters, said bennest.
based on the third-quarter data, zonda will be revising its projected year-end totals — for both total inventory and completed, unsold, empty units — to be lower than what had been anticipated, said bennest.
he added that if some projects are being shelved or converted to rental, it means fewer condos will be built and this will “put a cap on standing inventory levels rising a few years out (such as) in 2028 and onward.”
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