Greater Vancouver home sales dropped 12.9 per cent on a year-over-year basis in December, capping a year in which the region saw its lowest annual sales total in more than two decades.<\/p>\n
Greater Vancouver Realtors said 1,537 homes changed hands last month, 20.7 per cent below the 10-year seasonal average for December.<\/p>\n
The composite benchmark price for all residential properties stood at $1,114,800 at the end of 2025, representing a 4.5 per cent decrease over December 2024 and a 0.8 per cent decrease compared with November 2025.<\/p>\n
The board’s chief economist and vice-president of data analytics Andrew Lis called 2025 a year “for the history books,” as total residential sales fell 10.4 per cent from 2024 and 9.3 per cent from 2023.<\/p>\n
Last year\u2019s sales total of 23,800 was almost 25 per cent below the 10-year annual sales average.<\/p>\n
The board had initially predicted an uptick in activity for 2025 as the year got underway, however demand within the housing market soon slowed as U.S. President Donald Trump kick-started a trade war by levying various tariffs on Canadian goods.<\/p>\n
Tim Hill, a real estate agent with Re\/Max All Points Realty, said that led to hesitation among buyers, who were unsure if it was the right economic environment for a major purchase like a new home.<\/p>\n
“We were in a rut, like the market just wouldn’t get itself going,” said Hill in a phone interview.<\/p>\n
“People didn’t have confidence in what the market was doing and where prices would be, even on the short-term horizon.”<\/p>\n
Despite the sales decline, Lis noted that sellers were still keen to list their properties.<\/p>\n
“Sellers brought the highest total of listings to market on record since the mid-1990s, eclipsing the previous record high in 2008 by a little over 1,000 listings,” he said in a press release.<\/p>\n
There were more than 65,000 total properties listed in the region in 2025, an 8.2 per cent increase compared with 2024 and 28.4 per cent above 2023 levels.<\/p>\n
The total number of properties listed last year was also 13.1 per cent above the region\u2019s 10-year total annual average.<\/p>\n
Inventory levels have come down since mid-year, however.<\/p>\n
The board said there are currently 12,550 homes listed for sale in Metro Vancouver, a 14.6 per cent increase compared with December 2024 and 34.8 per cent above the 10-year seasonal average.<\/p>\n
In December, 1,849 detached, attached or apartment properties were newly listed for sale in the region, 10.3 per cent more than the same month a year earlier.<\/p>\n
Lis said that with sales down and plenty of inventory available, prices have eased across all property types since the start of 2025.<\/p>\n
The benchmark price for a detached home in December was $1,879,800, marking a 5.3 per cent decrease from a year earlier and a 1.1 per cent decrease compared with November 2025.<\/p>\n
Condo prices were also down 5.3 per cent year-over-year at $710,000, which was 0.6 per cent lower than the previous month. The benchmark price of a townhouse stood at $1,056,600 \u2014 five per cent below December 2024 and 0.8 per cent lower than November 2025.<\/p>\n
Lis added that borrowing costs fell nearly one full percentage point throughout the year.<\/p>\n
\u201cWith lower prices, lower borrowing costs, and plenty of inventory to choose from, homebuyers in 2026 are starting the year with favourable conditions,” he said.<\/p>\n
“Whether these conditions translate into a market with stronger demand will be the million-dollar question \u2014 and we\u2019ll be monitoring this story closely as it unfolds.\u201d<\/p>\n
But Hill said he doesn’t foresee a rush from buyers to get off the sidelines now that the calendar has flipped to 2026.<\/p>\n
He said many are still in wait-and-see mode, especially in case prices continue to fall.<\/p>\n
“I think it’s going to take some economic certainty for people to really come back,” he said, adding there is often a “herd mentality” within the Greater Vancouver real estate market.<\/p>\n
“If people are buying, everyone wants to buy and if people are more on the sidelines then more people are hesitant to pull the trigger.”<\/p>\n
This report by The Canadian Press was first published Jan. 5, 2026.<\/p>\n
Sammy Hudes, The Canadian Press<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Greater Vancouver home sales dropped 12.9 per cent on a year-over-year basis in December, capping a year in…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":218616,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[22],"tags":[131923,131924,273,131925,111,139,69,147],"class_list":["post-218615","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-environment","tag-annual-sales","tag-benchmark-price","tag-environment","tag-greater-vancouver","tag-new-zealand","tag-newzealand","tag-nz","tag-science"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/218615","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=218615"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/218615\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/218616"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=218615"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=218615"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=218615"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}