Metro Vancouver’s office market is still among the tightest in North America, says a new report from Newmark.

The region’s office vacancy and availability remained stable in the third quarter as no new downtown projects launched and there was modest new supply in the development pipeline. Stabilized vacancy in such suburbs as Burnaby and Surrey combined with tightening vacancy on the outskirts of Vancouver’s city limits offset rising vacancy in the Broadway corridor and downtown.

Overall downtown vacancy continued to hover in the 12% range, give or take 70 basis points, as it “stubbornly” has for the past two years even as class A vacancy has tightened, says the report authored by Andrew Petrozzi, Newmark’s head of Canadian research. Most suburban submarkets saw vacancy fall below 7%.

Concerns about the effect of increased U.S. tariffs and Canadian and American trade tensions continue to make occupiers wary.

“Office-leasing decisions require clarity on long-term business needs,” wrote Petrozzi. “Elevated economic uncertainty has encouraged significant hesitation for many tenants. As a result, some occupiers may have paused leasing decisions in [the third quarter.]”

Suburban nodes led third-quarter absorption of about 425,000 square feet. Meanwhile, new construction remains “largely at a standstill” downtown in the second half of 2025. That situation contributed further to the rising risk of a shortage of class A and trophy-class spaces in the late 2000s due to the time required to construct new assets.

Achievable rents must improve notably before investors are willing to support the first new tower in the next development cycle, according to Newmark.

Photo: Courtesy of Newmark