Lower Mainland 2023 commercial real estate sales totals and dollar volumes approached lows not witnessed since before the COVID-19 pandemic, according to a new Real Estate Board of Greater Vancouver report.

Total transactions and sales dollar volume fell 41.7% and 44.1%, respectively.

But REBGV does not anticipate a recurrence of the difficulties in 2024.

“While the 2023 annual figures paint a picture of a dismal year for commercial real estate in the Lower Mainland, more recent quarterly data are suggesting activity is starting to pick up across certain segments, which may indicate the worst is behind us,” said Andrew Lis, the group’s economics and data analytics director.

REBGV expects lower inflation and reduced borrowing costs, due to an anticipated Bank of Canada interest-rate cut to spur more activity in 2024, Lis added.

Office and retail sales took the biggest hit, falling 44% as 485 deals were completed versus 809 a year earlier. The combined dollar volume for those asset classes declined 44% to $1.3 billion from $2.3 billion in 2022.

Percentage-wise, multi-family suffered the biggest dollar-volume, 56.8% year-over-year to about $600 million in 2023 from $1.4 billion in 2022. Total multi-family transactions fell to 59 from 93. The drops came even though Ottawa scrapped the G.S.T. on apartment developments.

Industrial sales declined 35.2% to 335 transactions from $517 in 2022. But the dip in industrial dollar volume was relatively modest, 3.9% to $1.8 billion from $1.9 billion.

Investors continued to show strong appetite for industrial, which had limited available supply.