Where to Buy a Townhouse in City of Vancouver in 2019 – Full Ranking

When it comes to buying a townhouse, the City of Vancouver makes up more than 10% of the neighbourhoods in the Greater Vancouver Area where buyers can buy. With just under 40 neighbourhoods that offer townhomes (although, some communities will offer more selection than others), it’s hard to narrow down where to look. To help, we ranked the 38 neighbourhoods (32 if you omit neighbourhoods with no townhouse sales in 2018), based on three main criteria: value, momentum and economic outlook.

To be clear, our “value” category does not equate with cheap. Just because a neighbourhood offers cheaper priced housing doesn’t make it a great deal. What will make it a great deal is when the neighbourhood is on an upward momentum. To help identify those spots, we look for neighbourhoods whose prices steadily appreciate over time, and don’t fluctuate wildly (perhaps signalling a micro-bubble).

That said, we did notice a worrisome trend this year: Neighbourhoods that ranked high in our list, despite price corrections. When we examined these results what we found is that these neighbourhoods still hold value, but their momentum was thrown off in the last few years when desperate buyers overpaid to get into the market.

Finally, to determine a community’s current economic health and future possibilities we polled local experts: Realtors who specialize in these communities. The aim is to find local knowledge about the neighbourhood in order to capture potential hot-spots before they are well known. A good example, from a few years ago, is the Hastings East neighbourhood. For a long time, this was a rough-and-tumble community. While these elements are certainly still present, many local businesses and artists have flocked to this area helping to create a funky, vibrant feel. This has attracted more businesses, some big developers — as the Airey Group, who is responsible for the Oxford East Hastings project, a 38 unit located at 2141 East Hastings — and, of course, homeowners.

This year’s No. 1 ‘hood isn’t cheap

When it comes to real estate, anything over $1-million doesn’t sound affordable, yet, this year the top neighbourhood of False Creek has an average townhouse price that’s just below $1.16-million. Ouch.

Why the big price-tag, high-ranking? When compared to other Vancouver West neighbourhoods, False Creek townhouse prices are, on average, about 2.7% cheaper. Even with a $1.2-million home-buying budget, saving $32,400 sounds good. And then there’s the neighbourhood. It’s a tourist-destination; a hipster hangout and probably one of the coolest neighbourhoods in the City of Vancouver. Easy access to transit, nature and urban amenities make this a sought-after community and it shows. In one-year — the worse real estate year in a decade — prices for townhomes in False Creek rose by 15%. Over five years the price appreciation has been an astonishing 119%.

Of course, much like stock past performance cannot predict future returns, but we feel confident that this neighbourhood will retain its value and potentially appreciate better than other communities over the next few years.

Below is the full list that ranks each community based on the highest overall scores in value, momentum and economic desirability.

You can narrow down your townhome search by using the search function to display neighbourhoods only within a certain area (city) or district (larger municipality area).

10 Best Neighbourhoods to Buy a Townhouse in the City of Vancouver in 2019

1. False Creek, Vancouver West – $1,159,581
2. Collingwood VE, Vancouver East – $936,058
3. Marpole, Vancouver East – $1,252,695
4. Killarney VE, Vancouver East – $693,013
5. Hastings, Vancouver East – $978,914
6. University, Vancouver West – $2,029,747
7. Downtown VW, Vancouver West – $1,079,054
8. Fairview VW, Vancouver West – $1,065,958
9. Knight, Vancouver East – $1,033,783
10. South Granville, Vancouver West – $1,690,247

10 Worst Neighbourhoods to Buy a Townhouse in the City of Vancouver in 2019

1. S.W. Marine, Vancouver West – $1,658,250
2. Oakridge, Vancouver West – $1,452,742
3. Shaughnessy, Vancouver West, $2,346,180
4. Quilchena, Vancouver West – $1,641,250
5. Yaletown, Vancouver West – $2,002,206
6. Arbutus, Vancouver West – $1,933,450
7. Kitsilano, Vancouver West – $1,283,500
8. Kerrisdale, Vancouver West – $1,334,286
9. Hastings East, Vancouver East – $937,500
10. Dunbar, Vancouver West – $1,255,067

Romana King

Romana King is an award-winning personal finance writer, real estate expert, Contributing Editor at Zolo Homebase, and a best-selling Amazon author of House Poor No More: 9 Steps that Grow the Value of Your Home and Net Worth. Romana has contributed to various business and lifestyle publications including CBC.ca, Toronto Sun, Maclean’s, MoneySense, Globe & Mail Custom Content Team, among others.

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