Calgary housing market

New-home prices

Statistics Canada's new housing price index for Calgary stood at 129.7 in Sep 2026, unchanged from a year earlier, compared with down 2.0% for Canada as a whole.

With December 2016 set to 100, the index means builders are charging about 29.7% more for a comparable new home than they did then.

The index peaked at 133.8 in Feb 2025 and is now 3.1% below that high, so new-home prices have given back part of their earlier gains.

The index tracks contractors' selling prices for new homes of the same specifications. It does not cover resale homes, so it shows builder pricing rather than the whole market.

Construction and supply

Builders started 24,403 homes in Calgary over the 12 months to Sep 2026, down 12.4% from the previous 12 months.

23,827 homes were completed over the same period (down 6.8%), and 26,252 were under construction at the latest count (up 2.1% year over year).

More homes are being started than finished, so the construction pipeline is growing and should keep completions up in the coming months.

Building permits, which come before construction starts, covered 25,687 dwelling units over 12 months, down 1.8%. A drop in permits usually points to fewer starts ahead.

Of newly completed homes, 1,412 were still unsold or unrented at the latest count (up 51.7%), while 8,174 new homes were sold or rented on completion over the last 12 months (down 8.6%).

Population and housing need

Calgary's population was estimated at 1,836,012 (July 1, 2025), growing 2.9% over the year.

That works out to 13.3 housing starts per 1,000 residents, and 13.0 completions per 1,000.

Roughly 52,351 residents were added in the latest year, about 2.2 new residents for every home completed. That is close to or below typical household size, so new supply is keeping pace with population growth.

Rental market

CMHC's Rental Market Survey put the purpose-built rental vacancy rate at 5.0% (October 2025 survey), up 0.2 percentage points from the previous survey. A rate of 3% or more is generally considered balanced or soft, giving renters more choice.

The average two-bedroom rent across all purpose-built units was $1,908 a month, up 1.7% year over year.

Statistics Canada's quarterly estimates show advertised two-bedroom rents of $1,890 versus $1,930 actually paid by renters. Advertised rents are at or below what sitting tenants pay, a sign that the market for new leases has softened.

Borrowing costs

Borrowers who took out a new uninsured mortgage in Aug 2026 paid an average of 4.58% on fixed terms of five years or more and 3.90% on variable rates, according to the Bank of Canada. The five-year-plus fixed average is up 0.3 percentage points from a year earlier.

Variable rates sit 0.68 points below long fixed terms, so borrowers are paying a premium for payment certainty.

The Bank of Canada's policy rate is 2.50% and the banks' prime rate is 4.70%. Variable-rate mortgages are priced off prime, so they move when the policy rate changes; fixed rates follow Government of Canada bond yields, with the 5-year yield at 3.46%.