We might be touching bottom—but it’s not time to sit back

Written in November 2025. Some details have changed since, so check current numbers before you act on this.

Has Vancouver real estate hit bottom? Maybe: the conditions are lining up, but nobody can confirm it yet, so you position early instead of waiting for a headline. In my video “Vancouver Real Estate: Have We FINALLY Hit The BOTTOM?” I get into the nuance, the data and the strategy. Bottoms aren’t obvious until after they happen. But if you play it smart, you can position yourself on the winning side of the next move.

These are the things that matter, and what you should do about them.

✅ Is the Vancouver market at the bottom yet?

• Listings are piling up. Inventory is at decade highs in many Vancouver submarkets.
• Sales volumes are weak. We’re seeing sustained softness, not a flash pause.
• Prices are drifting, or in some pockets, slipping.
• Meanwhile, mortgage rate pressures and upcoming renewals are a looming wildcard.

So yeah: the conditions for “bottoming” are aligning. But alignment ≠ confirmation.

📉 A bottom in sales isn’t a bottom in prices

When I recorded this in spring 2025, I said sales looked to be bottoming out, and I was careful about what I meant: sales, not pricing. Pricing can keep drifting down or stay flat for a while, because there’s still a lot of inventory and a lot of selection. The order goes like this. Sales start to pick up, inventory gets absorbed and then prices follow, usually with a lag of a few months. That’s why I watch sales first. New listings had also started to slow in Vancouver, one more sign that buyers were beginning to absorb what’s out there.

Be honest about what we can’t know, too. These signs were in their infancy, and a single month of data doesn’t make a trend. Plenty of people are financially strapped, with a record number of renewals coming, so there will be opportunities no matter how this plays out.

🧭 Why do confidence and monthly payments matter so much?

People lean too hard on the board stats. Canadian macro data tells you more about how buyers and sellers will behave. I watch the Nanos consumer confidence and real estate outlook indexes, which fell from October 2024 and then made a quick V-shaped move back up in May 2025. All this market needed was some stability, and confidence is what’s been plaguing it. Colleagues around the Lower Mainland were seeing more activity and more buyers willing to write offers.

Affordability is the other marker, and I don’t mean home prices. Most people care about their monthly mortgage payment. If you can stay within your monthly means, the price matters less. Payments peaked around the start of 2023 and have been falling, and every Bank of Canada cut helps. If confidence keeps rising while payments keep dropping, those are signs pointing to a recovery.

✂️ Why It’s Dangerous to Assume “Bottom”

• It’s a trap to marketers and click‑baiters: “Bottom” sells. Reality’s messier.
• Some submarkets will bounce first (condos, infill, strata), others lag (detached, outer edges).
• If you lean too hard on “now’s the time,” you risk buying too early in neighborhoods that haven’t hit the floor yet.

Don't let the media dictate your move. Let the data + strategy do that.

🧠 What signals show a market bottom in Vancouver?

1. Watch new listings + expired listings combo. If listings are rising and expired listings (homes that failed to sell) are spiking, that’s a stronger signal of stress. You want that tipping zone. The Kyle Mark Report tracks your area, free with an account.
2. Map the outliers. Some buildings, pockets, and streets will start reversing first. Your job: spot those early. Be first to sniff out momentum before the general market pivots.
3. Factor in mortgage renewals. A chunk of homeowners locked into ultra‑low rates in 2020 to 21. Their mortgage renewals in 2025 to 26 could force some hand sales, boosting supply later. That hedges your timing risk. I broke down the renewal wave in this post on renewals.

Don’t ignore affordability swings. If rates drop, buyer power surges. If rates stay high, many buyers are frozen out. Your entry needs margin for rate volatility, and the mortgage calculator shows you how much.

📢 Move With Intention (Don’t Just React)

• Buyers: target neighborhoods where leading indicators are turning (homes selling faster, fewer price drops). Start your due diligence now with how I work with buyers.
• Sellers: you have limited leverage. Price decisively, or you’ll bleed commission and time. My seller page shows how.

Investors: this is your season, for those who hold through noise. You don’t need perfect entry. You need good enough + better insight than the average.

🎯 Should you keep cherry-picking with low offers?

A lot of buyers are throwing out low offers and jumping to the next property if one doesn’t work. Be very careful with that as the market starts to shift. You could lose a home that’s a great fit over a gap of $50,000 or less. On a purchase in the $800,000 to $3 million range, I’d get in there, because you’ll reap the rewards in the years to come.

Keep in mind this isn’t one market, either. Even with the most inventory we’d seen in over a decade, I was working with multiple buyers in Burnaby’s detached market where there wasn’t much to choose from. Your segment might feel nothing like the headline, so check your own before you decide you have all the time in the world. Slow markets don’t last forever, and when things change, they can change quickly.

⏳ Should you act now or wait for the bottom?

• Because the next rate cut might be the precipice of a rebound.
• Because some of the best deals will vanish, before the “bottom” gets the media crown.

Because timing slightly early with conviction beats waiting for perfect confirmation.

📞 Book your 30-minute strategy call now , Let me map where you should be shifting now. (I’ll tell you the exact pockets I’m watching, and what to watch for.)