Victoria named trending Canadian rental spot as Vancouver slumps
A new rental report examining trending cities around the country identified one B.C. city as a spot with growing interest from renters.
The report, compiled by RentCafe, examines rental insights nationwide for Q2 2025.
The B.C. city that rounded out the top 10 was Victoria.
RentCafe determined which Canadian cities were trending rental spots by analyzing available listings, listing views, apartments saved as favourites, and personal searches. Rent cafe analyzed millions of these interactions.
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Victoria actually dropped one rank point compared to last quarter, but remained in the top 10. It ranked #6 for page views, #14 for the number of times it was saved as a favourite spot, and #11 for saved searches.
Nanaimo is another island city experiencing growing interest from renters. It actually ranked #1 for availability.
“The availability rate score was calculated by dividing the total vacant units at the city level for the second quarter of 2025 by the total units and a quarter-over-quarter comparison of the same. The lowest rate received maximum points.”
It makes sense why places in B.C., such as Victoria and Nanaimo, are seeing increased rental interest compared to a spot like Vancouver. According to a Rentals.ca report, in August, the average asking rent for a one-bedroom unit in Nanaimo was $1,892, which is significantly lower than the $2,515 average in Vancouver.
Meanwhile, Victoria hit an average asking rent of $2,065.
Examining big cities in the RentCafe report, Vancouver experienced a decline in interest compared to the previous quarter.
“While [Vancouver] did record a 42 per cent increase in favourited listings, this gain was offset by significant year-over-year declines in both page views and saved searches. In this case, a spike in availability may point to growing supply — or signal a cooling sense of urgency among apartment hunters.”
You might be surprised to learn that Winnipeg, Manitoba, topped the list, “emerging as Canada’s leading city for apartment-hunters in the second quarter of 2025.”
The stats make it a little less surprising, as Winnipeg was named one of the most affordable places to rent in Canada in the most recent Rentals.ca report.