cmhc’s 2025 vancouver housing forecast: what it means for landowners, developers, and investors
Something’s shifted in Vancouver real estate—and not everyone has noticed yet.
CMHC’s 2025 forecast confirms what some of us have sensed for a while: the era of fast money and investor-driven growth is winding down. Price gains are flattening. Presale buyers are pulling back. And for the first time in decades, the most important factor shaping land value isn’t the market—it’s policy.
If you’re holding land, developing a site, or quietly planning your exit, this report changes the calculus. Not with shock or spectacle, but underlining a slow, structural reset that will favour those who understand how policy, timing, and strategy quietly shape the next move.
Read on to discover:
Why land value may now be capped by your OCP—not market optimism
How investor flight is changing the game for pre-sales and project financing
What CMHC’s targets really mean for developers (and where it gets hard)
And how landowners can make the most of this moment—if they know what to look for
The future won’t reward the loudest—it will reward those who can read the terrain and act accordingly. And right now, the map has changed. CMHC just reset the benchmark for affordability.
affordability targets shift back to 2019 levels
CMHC has formally lowered its affordability benchmark. Instead of targeting early-2000s affordability, the new goal is to return to 2019 levels, when Vancouver’s average home price equaled 71% of the average household income.
That’s not cheap—but it’s at least familiar. CMHC recognizes that the post-pandemic surge changed the playing field. For landowners and developers alike, this shift signals policy support for stabilization—not price suppression.
to meet that goal, we need 25,000 to 32,200 new homes a year
The required rate of housing starts in Vancouver climbs to 32,200 per year, compared to the 24,978 annual average of the past decade . That’s a 29% jump—ambitious, but not unmanageable.
For developers, this sets a clear benchmark. For landowners, it confirms there’s still strong demand for well-positioned sites. All groups could benefit from increased efficiencies that will be required to meet these targets.
younger households are driving new demand
One of CMHC’s most important findings: lower prices create more households. As housing becomes slightly more affordable, younger adults form new households rather than remaining with parents or roommates .
This subtle demographic shift should influence what gets built: smaller, rental-friendly, and affordability-focused formats. Developers who respond early will be ahead of the market.
landowners: this isn’t a price crash
Even if supply targets are met, Vancouver home prices are still expected to rise 8.3% over the next 10 years, or roughly 2.6% annually—about the pace of inflation .
For landowners, that’s welcome news. CMHC explicitly states that supply increases are not fast enough to cause a price shock. If you’ve been waiting for signs of a market collapse before selling, this report says: don’t bother.
But if price growth alone won’t drive future gains, planning policy will. In this new era, your returns will depend more on land use designation, density entitlements, and alignment with municipal priorities than on riding the market. Owners who understand how to navigate zoning, transit overlays, and emerging area plans will be the ones who capture the most value. Now more than ever, land value is a policy game—and smart strategy will outperform passive holding.
investors are exiting, and that changes everything
Flat price growth means real estate investors will look elsewhere. CMHC expects a noticeable decline in investor buyers—particularly smaller, speculative players who once made up a large portion of Vancouver’s presale market.
Without these buyers:
Presale hurdles become harder to clear.
Developers will need more equity up front.
Financial institutions may not reduce their risk thresholds, making it harder to launch projects with high pre-sale requirements.
This could significantly constrain new supply, especially for condo towers.
pre-sale timing is now a make-or-break decision
With fewer investors ready to jump in, developers must shorten the gap between pre-sales and occupancy. That means more design and predevelopment risk must be frontloaded—requiring deeper pockets and stronger planning.
Given the recent wave of foreclosures in Metro Vancouver, this won’t be a popular strategy. But it may be necessary.
submarket competition will get sharper
One of the most actionable insights from the CMHC report: supply clustering in a single neighbourhood will hurt pricing. Developers must monitor not just what they’re building, but what everyone else nearby is doing, and when.
For landowners, this matters too. Your development site’s appeal to developers will rise or fall based on how many others are launching nearby.
differentiation is no longer optional
The era of “build it and they will come” is over.
Commodity product will earn commodity pricing—and maybe not even that. CMHC’s projections suggest a more rational, flatter price environment. In this new landscape:
Know your target buyer or renter before you design.
Build with purpose, not just density.
Differentiate in design, programming, and execution.
long-term investors could become development funders
Here’s a trend to watch: if smaller investors leave, but long-term capital still believes in real estate, developers could attract new funding partners—especially from former would-be condo buyers frustrated by the lack of returns.
Developers with credibility, execution experience, and a clear value proposition may be able to raise more equity from non-institutional, high-net-worth individuals seeking stable exposure.
landowners: value is not just about timing—it’s about policy
CMHC’s forecast makes one thing clear: future appreciation will be modest. With prices expected to track inflation, the benefit of holding land purely for growth is shrinking. If you’re hoping things will look very different in 2 or 3 years, chances are—they won’t.
That doesn’t mean everyone should sell now. The real opportunity isn’t in timing the market—it’s in understanding your policy position and how it shapes your next move. Even if you’re holding long-term, that clarity can guide refinancing, estate planning, or partnership strategy.
If your site already benefits from a new Official Community Plan (OCP) or up-to-date land use designation, your value is largely set. In those cases, waiting often means more holding costs without meaningful upside. But if you’re in a neighbourhood with an old OCP (especially pre-2010), or your area is actively being studied or rewritten, it may be worth holding for more certainty or better use potential.
One exception: if your property offers potential for a more ambitious or comprehensive development—a large, coordinated plan that goes beyond what current zoning allows—time is not on your side. Acting before new policy locks in a lower-density outcome could be critical.
Every municipality in B.C. is now required to have an OCP. That’s a historic change. For many areas, it will be the first major update in decades—and one of the biggest drivers of land value for years to come.
summary: realism, not pessimism
CMHC’s 2025 forecast confirms what many of us have sensed for some time: the era of effortless gains—where homeowners and investors could do nothing but buy and wait—has ended. That’s not a guess. That’s the new baseline.
Vancouver’s future isn’t about riding a market wave. It’s about understanding where policy, planning, and fundamentals intersect—and how they shape real estate value over time.
For landowners, that means knowing whether your site is aligned with an up-to-date OCP or still waiting in a legacy framework.
For developers, it means navigating tighter pre-sale environments, rising equity requirements, and more strategic positioning.
And for investors, it means rethinking what kind of returns are realistic—and where true value will be created in a flatter-growth landscape.
The next decade will reward those who lead with insight, timing, and a deep understanding of how land use drives value—not just those who wait for the next boom.
ready to talk strategy? let’s make a smart move—together
Whether you’re sitting on a development site and wondering if now is the time to sell, or you’re a developer looking to plan your next move—or your exit—this is the moment to act with insight, not instinct. The trends in CMHC’s 2025 report aren’t just theory; they’re reshaping who buys, who builds, and what succeeds in Vancouver’s market.
If you’re ready to apply these insights to your specific situation, let’s have a confidential, one-on-one conversation. No pressure, no pitch—just seasoned advice from someone who understands land use, development feasibility, and how to get the best outcome in today’s evolving market.
You’ll find my contact information in the footer below—reach out anytime.
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Canada Mortgage and Housing Corporation. (2025). Canada’s housing supply shortages: Moving to a new framework. https://assets.cmhc-schl.gc.ca/sites/cmhc/professional/housing-markets-data-and-research/housing-research/research-reports/accelerate-supply/canadas-housing-supply-shortages-new-framework/2025-canadas-housing-supply-shortages-new-framework-en.pdf
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