Construction · OpenStats
OpenStats Building Permit Value
OpenStats
Cities ranked by total Statistics Canada building permit value in the calendar year. Rank 1 is highest value.
4 editions · 2023–2026
#2
Latest · 2026 · of 42
Score 9546657000
British Columbia
Vancouver
Coast Salish shore, CPR terminus
Vancouver in brief
Vancouver’s shoreline was already home to Musqueam, Squamish, and Tsleil-Waututh villages when Europeans charted Burrard Inlet. A mill town called Granville sat on the water until the Canadian Pacific Railway made it the western terminus and the city of Vancouver was born in 1886.
Fire wiped the young city the same year it incorporated, then locals rebuilt in a hurry. Mountains on one side and freighters on the other still set the mood: outdoorsy, rainy, and oddly optimistic about bike lanes.
Gastown’s steam clock and Stanley Park’s seawall keep visitors busy; the icons below keep the open-data nerds busy.
Drawn from Wikipedia, Atlas Obscura.
Permits, tax, radon & more for Vancouver
Open the live numbers for Vancouver. Each link goes to the original topic page for this city.
Follow Vancouver by email
When Vancouver moves in a ranking, posts new permit figures, or lands in a study, get a short note. A few sends a year, only when something changes.
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#4
City Score rank
97%
City Score
5
Owned lists in score
City Score over time
The green line averages OpenStats-owned rankings (radon, permit value, mill rates). Grey dots mark every published placement across all studies below.
Rankings for Vancouver
Each study below is its own ranking. Where a study has more than one edition for this city, the chart shows standing across those years only.
Composite · OpenStats
OpenStats City Score
OpenStats
Average standing across OpenStats-owned rankings built from public data (currently radon, building permit value, and residential mill rates). Each placement is scored from 0–1 within its edition, then averaged. External livability lists stay on hometown pages as separate published appearances.
Single edition · 2026
#4
Published · 2026 · of 125
Score 0.967
Only one published edition places Vancouver in this study so far. Open the edition for method notes and the full table.
Health · OpenStats
OpenStats Highest Indoor Radon
OpenStats
Communities ranked by Health Canada survey mean indoor radon (Bq/m³). Rank 1 is the highest mean.
Single edition · 2026
#109
Published · 2026 · of 117
Score 35.4
Only one published edition places Vancouver in this study so far. Open the edition for method notes and the full table.
Housing
CMHC Average 2-Bedroom Rent — Lowest Rent
Canada Mortgage and Housing Corporation
Average rent for purpose-built 2-bedroom apartments (all tenants) from CMHC Rental Market Survey. Rank 1 = lowest average rent among covered CMAs.
Single edition · 2025
#18
Published · 2025 · of 18
Score 2363
Only one published edition places Vancouver in this study so far. Open the edition for method notes and the full table.
Housing
CMHC Purpose-Built Rental Vacancy — Highest Vacancy
Canada Mortgage and Housing Corporation
Purpose-built rental apartment vacancy rate from CMHC Rental Market Survey (October). Rank 1 = highest vacancy (most available rental stock among covered CMAs).
2 editions · 2024–2025
#7
Latest · 2025 · of 18
Score 3.7
Housing
Demographia International Housing Affordability — Canadian Markets
Demographia / Frontier Centre for Public Policy
Canadian subset of Demographia median multiple (median house price / median household income). Rank 1 = most affordable (lowest median multiple) among Canadian major markets in the international survey.
3 editions · 2024–2026
#6
Latest · 2026 · of 6
Score 10.8 · Impossibly Unaffordable
Livability
EIU Global Liveability Index
Economist Intelligence Unit
Ranks ~173 cities on stability, healthcare, culture & environment, education, and infrastructure. Full dataset is paid; OpenStats stores only ranks and scores published in free press releases and news coverage.
4 editions · 2023–2026
#9
Latest · 2026 · of 173
Score 96
Livability
Globe and Mail Most Livable Cities
The Globe and Mail
2023 data partnership with Environics Analytics ranking 439 Canadian communities on ten livability categories.
Single edition · 2023
#14
Published · 2023 · of 439
Only one published edition places Vancouver in this study so far. Open the edition for method notes and the full table.
Livability
Maclean's Best Communities
Maclean's
Successor-style municipal livability ranking published by Maclean's for 2019 and 2021 (no 2020 edition).
2 editions · 2019–2021
#174
Latest · 2021 · of 415
Quality of life
Mercer Quality of Living City Ranking
Mercer
Expat-oriented quality of living ranking across 39 factors in 10 categories. OpenStats stores Canadian cities named in free Mercer press releases (typically top-25 highlights), not the full paid ranking.
2 editions · 2023–2024
#7
Latest · 2024 · of 450
Livability
MoneySense Best Places to Live
MoneySense
Annual composite ranking of Canadian municipalities on economy, housing, crime, health, and weather.
5 editions · 2014–2018
#88
Latest · 2018 · of 415
Housing
National Bank Housing Affordability — Highest Mortgage Stress
National Bank of Canada Economics and Strategy
Ranked by Mortgage Payment as a Percentage of Income (MPPI) on a representative home. Rank 1 = highest MPPI (least affordable). Free quarterly Housing Affordability Monitor tables.
2 editions · 2025–2026
#1
Latest · 2026 · of 10
Score 81.9
Quality of life
Numbeo Quality of Life Index by City
Numbeo
Crowd-sourced composite Quality of Life Index. Historical snapshots are free on Numbeo ranking pages; OpenStats cites Canadian cities from those public pages (cite_only). Higher index scores are better; ranks are global position on the snapshot page.
3 editions · 2024–2026
#87
Latest · 2026 · of 304
Score 180.7
Housing
RBC Housing Affordability — Least Affordable Markets
RBC Economics
Ranked by RBC aggregate Housing Affordability Measure (% of median pre-tax household income for mortgage, property taxes, and utilities on a benchmark home). Rank 1 = highest ownership-cost burden (least affordable). CMA markets mapped to primary city slugs.
2 editions · 2024–2025
#1
Latest · 2025 · of 13
Score 89.2
Worth knowing in Vancouver
Distinctive local notes and places, each linked to its source.
Vancouver is a major city in Western Canada, located in the Lower Mainland region of British Columbia.
As the most populous city in the province, the 2021 Canadian census recorded 662,248 people in the city, up from 631,486 in 2016.
Dude Chilling Park started as a guerrilla renaming of a Vancouver park sign and was later officially adopted by the city.
The Marine Building's Art Deco lobby and terra cotta exterior have stood in for famous comic-book landmarks on film.
Places to see
VanDusen Garden's Elizabethan Hedge Maze
One of only six Elizabethan hedge mazes in North America, planted from about 3,000 pyramidal cedars in 1981.
Dr. Sun Yat-Sen Classical Chinese Garden
A traditional Ming Dynasty-style Chinese garden built in the middle of Vancouver's Chinatown.
Gastown Steam Clock
A working steam-powered clock on Water Street in Victorian Gastown, one of only a few of its kind in the world.
The Sam Kee (Jack Chow) Building
At just six feet two inches deep, Guinness and Ripley's have called this Chinatown office building the world's narrowest freestanding commercial structure.
