By Elke Porter | WBN News Vancouver | June 23, 2025
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When Ozzie Jurock, the German-born real estate guru whose real estate blog at www.ozbuzz.ca sports some 35,000 subscribers, sounded the alarm about British Columbia's housing market in 2022. His actual headline in the April issue of his Ozbuzz blog was: “The High is in Place”. He noted that the then price for an average house in Surrey clocked in at 2 million and he said: “That’s it – for a while.”

Since 2022 the housing market has undergone a sharp reversal from presale to resale markets, from commercial to industrial and no joy in the office sector either. Several developers have put their finished but unsold condos on fire sale this month – like given a 25% discount. Says Jurock: “It is a great buyers market…and if you believe in BC’s future, now may well be the time to make – and get – that stink bid price on your new home”. No question about it , we are now witnessing an unprecedented crisis that goes far beyond typical market corrections.

Ann McMillan president and CEO of UDI (Urban Land Institute) took pen to paper and pointed a sharp finger directly at all levels of government: Ann: The numbers paint a stark picture of systemic collapse. In Q1 2025, a staggering 22% of land sales over $5 million were court-ordered—more than double the previous year's rate.

This isn't just a blip; three of Metro Vancouver's four largest residential land transactions in 2024 were also court-ordered sales, signaling widespread financial distress among developers and investors.

The construction pipeline is hemorrhaging. Unsold condo inventory is projected to surge 60% this year, climbing from 2,179 units to nearly 3,500. Most pre-sale projects—whether wood frame, concrete, or townhomes—are tracking well below the 70% threshold needed for construction financing. Housing starts in Metro Vancouver plummeted 15% from 2023 to 2024, with Burnaby, once a housing delivery leader, experiencing a catastrophic 52% decline to its lowest level since 2015.

The human cost is equally devastating. Rennie Marketing cut 25% of its workforce, with President Greg Zayadi declaring "The shifts we're seeing in real estate aren't temporary, they're structural." Wesgroup followed suit, announcing major layoffs as CEO Beau Jarvis cited "unprecedented and compounding challenges." Provincial resale inventory is expected to exceed 40,000 listings—the highest in over a decade. Residential building permits dropped 8.1% in 2024, with some municipalities seeing declines as high as 85.9% in Delta.

“The canaries in the coalmine have indeed stopped singing,” says Anne "The only way that happens is thorough action from governments at all levels. Mark Carney, Gregor Robertson, David Eby, Ravi Kahlon, what is your concrete, actionable, and fact-based plan to get housing back on track?

Municipal leaders, what are you doing first thing Monday to make your contribution to solving the housing problem?" The structural changes are here to stay—the question is whether leadership will rise to meet this unprecedented challenge before further damage is done to the province's economic foundation.

TAGS: #BC Housing Crisis #Ozzie Jurock #Real Estate Trends #Vancouver Real Estate #UDI Insights #Housing Market Update #WBN News Vancouver #Elke Porter

Connect with Elke at Westcoast German Media or on LinkedIn: Elke Porter or contact her on WhatsApp:  +1 604 828 8788. Public Relations. Communications. Education.

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