Market Insight Series – September 2026
What does the current Victoria real estate market look like?
August's numbers are in, and they broke the pattern. If you want to see what the Market Insight for the previous month looked like, click here.
Here is the headline: sales went up, and they went up a lot. 591 properties sold across the Victoria Real Estate Board region in August. That is 12.6 per cent more than the 525 sold in August 2025, and according to the Board it was the strongest August for sales activity in five years.
Now hold that thought, because prices did not follow. The benchmark single-family home board-wide came in at $1,163,100, down 0.6 per cent month over month, and also coincidentally down the same amount year over year. More buyers, same prices. That combination tells you something specific about who is transacting and why.
Let's go through it.
Sales Came Back — And Condo Sales Came Back Hardest
591 sales total last month. Up 12.6 per cent year over year. Down 12.2 per cent from July, which is ordinary August seasonality and not a signal.
Underneath the headline is the part that actually matters. Single-family sales rose 15.3 per cent to 309. Condo sales rose 15.1 per cent to 175. Townhouse sales fell 4.5 per cent to 63.
Compare that to what I wrote last month. In July, detached was up 4.1 per cent while condos were down 7.1 per cent. I described it then as a financing story wearing a housing costume — the segments first-time buyers depend on were the soft ones.
One month later the condo market posted a 15.1 per cent gain. That is a genuine reversal, and it is the single most interesting number in this report.
Inventory Is Tightening, Quietly
3,662 active listings at the end of August. That is down 4.8 per cent from July's 3,847, and up just 1.7 per cent from the 3,600 a year ago.
Read that carefully, because the trend changed. A month ago inventory was running 3.9 per cent above last year. Now it is only 1.7 per cent above. The gap is closing — not because listings collapsed, but because sales rose into them.
Broken out: 1,305 single-family detached listings, 892 condos, 413 townhouses.
The sales-to-active-listings ratio landed near 20 per cent. The BC Real Estate Association's threshold puts anything below 17 per cent in buyers'-market territory and anything above 28 per cent in sellers'-market territory. 20 per cent is balanced — same category as last month, though slightly firmer within it.
Properties took an average of 54 days to sell, against 53 a year ago. Essentially flat. And the sell-to-list ratio across all property types was 51 per cent — roughly half of homes that get listed find a buyer.
Prices Are Doing Almost Nothing, Which Is the Point
Here is where you have to be careful, because "sales jumped 12.6 per cent" sounds like a price story and it is not.
Board-wide, the MLS® HPI benchmark for a single-family home is $1,163,100 — down 0.6 per cent from July and 1.5 per cent from a year ago. The condo benchmark is $547,500 and the townhouse benchmark is $792,800, little change since last month. Although townhome are up 1.3 per cent year over year.
In the Victoria Core the picture is the same shape. The single-family benchmark is $1,301,800, down 0.6 per cent from $1,317,200 a year ago and down from July's $1,311,000. The Core condo benchmark is $553,600 — and that one is up slightly, 0.9 per cent from $548,900 last August and up from July's $548,600. Core townhouses sit at $856,300.
That condo number deserves attention. Condo sales up 15.1 per cent and the Core condo benchmark up 0.9 per cent, in the same month, after a year of the condo segment being the weak one. Two data points do not make a trend. But they are pointing the same direction for the first time in a while.
Money Costs What It Costs
Which brings us to the number that is actually driving everything. Five-year fixed rates are generally falling between 4.04 and 4.97 per cent — RBC and CIBC both at 4.59 on their high-ratio product, BMO at 4.74, TD at 4.84. Scotiabank is the outlier, publishing no discounted five-year fixed at all and leaving its posted 6.09 per cent standing. For the big five banks, the five-year variable runs between 3.65 to 4.90 per cent, with RBC at prime less 0.80 and Scotiabank's Flex Value at the top of the range.
Run the lowest fixed rate through the math on the benchmark home and you get the payment any buyer in this market is actually solving for:
Who's Actually Buying
For most of this year the answer was: people who already own something. Move-up buyers with equity, downsizers, cash buyers — households where a rate change moves the payment but not the decision.
August complicates that. A 15.1 per cent jump in condo sales is not move-up buyers. That is the entry rung getting used again. Some of it is buyers who waited through 2025 deciding the waiting was not paying. Some of it is simply that a $2,734 monthly payment is a different conversation than a $4,914 one. And possibly much more attractive for some.
The townhouse number is the odd one out — down 4.5 per cent, and with 413 active listings against 63 sales it is the slowest-turning segment on the board. If you are selling a townhouse right now, you have more competition per buyer than in either of the other two categories.
What This Means If You're Buying
You still have leverage, but slightly less of it than a month ago. There are 3,662 properties on the market and homes are taking 54 days to sell. That is still a market where you can view a place twice, ask for conditions, and walk away. But inventory fell 4.8 per cent in a month and the year-over-year cushion narrowed from 3.9 per cent to 1.7 per cent. If that continues into the autumn, conditions get tighter, not looser.
What This Means If You're Selling
591 homes sold in August, the most in five years for the month. The market works.
But half of what gets listed still does not sell, and the average listing takes 54 days. Buyers with 3,662 options are not going to overlook deferred maintenance, an optimistic price, or bad photos, because they do not have to. Preparation, presentation and a defensible price remain the whole game.
If you are in the townhouse segment, price sharper than you think you need to. That is the one category where sales went backwards.
The Bottom Line
591 sales, up 12.6 per cent year over year and the strongest August in five years. 3,662 active listings, down 4.8 per cent on the month. A 20 per cent absorption rate. Single-family sales up 15.3 per cent, condos up 15.1 per cent, townhouses down 4.5 per cent. Detached benchmark $1,163,100, down 0.6 per cent on the year. Condo $547,500. Townhouse $792,900. Fixed money between 4.04 and 4.97 per cent. Fifty-four days to sell.
Put it together and you get a market where demand quietly returned without dragging prices with it. That is a healthier thing than it sounds. Prices holding flat while volume recovers is what a functioning market looks like — it means buyers came back at a level they could actually afford, rather than bidding each other into another 2021.
The interesting question for the autumn is whether the condo recovery holds. If it does, the ladder starts working again from the bottom up, and that changes everything above it.
Glossary Term
Sales-to-Active-Listings Ratio
The sales-to-active-listings ratio divides the month's residential sales by the number of residential listings sitting on the market at month end. It is the cleanest single measure of supply and demand in a local market. The BC Real Estate Association's regression work sets the bands for Victoria: below 17 per cent is a buyers' market with downward pressure on prices, above 28 per cent is a sellers' market with upward pressure, and 17 to 28 per cent is balanced. August 2026 came in near 20 per cent — balanced, and slightly firmer than July.
Resources
1. VREB Insight: https://www.vreb.org/current-statistics#gsc.tab=0
2. Mortgage Calculator: https://www.cchwebsites.com/content/calculators/CAMortgageLoan.html
3. Mortgage Rate By Bank: https://www.rbcroyalbank.com/mortgages/mortgage-rates.html | https://www.td.com/ca/en/personal-banking/products/mortgages/mortgage-rates/ | https://www.bmo.com/main/personal/mortgages/mortgage-rates/ | https://www.scotiabank.com/ca/en/personal/rates-prices/mortgages-rates.html | https://www.cibc.com/en/interest-rates/mortgage-rates.html
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