Townhouse prices could balloon to $2M in these surprising Metro Vancouver spots

Even though Vancouver real estate is notoriously expensive and out of reach, some nearby cities are quickly catching up and are expected to surpass it.

A new blog post from Zoocasa analyzes real estate markets across Metro Vancouver and the Sea to Sky regions, looking at when townhouses might become worth a whopping $2 million.

Zoocasa calls townhouses “the Goldilocks of Canadian real estate.”

“They’re the perfect in-between of a cozy apartment and a sprawling detached home that requires a small inheritance and a lot of luck. The townhouse is that elusive just-right middle ground: the square footage a growing family actually needs, a patch of grass to call your own, and a garage to park the car.”

But according to Zoocasa’s analysis, townhouse prices in some markets might escalate quickly in the coming years.

They looked at townhouse prices across 16 markets in Metro Vancouver and the Sea-to-Sky from May 2016 to May 2026. Assuming the rate of growth would remain the same, they used this data to project how long it would take a townhouse in each market to be worth an average of $2 million, with the caveat that past performance does not guarantee future results.

And Vancouver, surprisingly, was not one of the top cities.

Instead, townhouse prices are expected to climb the fastest in New Westminster, Maple Ridge, and Coquitlam.

From 2016 to 2026, the average price of a New West townhouse jumped from $534,500 to $1,283,600, a nearly $750,000 increase in 10 years.

Using historical compound annual growth rates, which “smooths out year-to-year market fluctuations to calculate a steady average annual growth percentage,” Zoocasa predicts that in just five years, it will cost $2 million to buy a townhouse in New West.

And Maple Ridge and Coquitlam townhouses could be worth this much in another decade.

The townhouse value in Maple Ridge grew substantially over 10 years, from $363,000 to $868,500, about a $500,000 increase.

In Coquitlam, prices went from an average of $522,900 in 2016 to $1,023,500 in 2026.

Zoocasa projects that Port Coquitlam, Port Moody, Burnaby South, and Pitt Meadows townhouses will be worth $2 million in 11 years.

What about Vancouver?

Despite the sky-high costs of Vancouver real estate, its townhouse appreciation is much slower than that of some of its neighbours.

Zoocasa projected that Vancouver townhouses will hit these prices by 2042, 16 years from now.

They looked at Vancouver and Vancouver East, where the rate of growth was much slower than in some of Metro Vancouver’s suburbs.

The average price of a townhouse in West Vancouver was already quite high in 2016, at $1,035,400. In 2026, it is $1,331,700, just worth under $300,000 more.

In Vancouver East, prices climbed from $725,500 to $1,067,400 in the past 10 years, going up by about 340,000.

Zoocasa said that entry price is the most important variable, pointing out that a city like New West had a price point that buyers could get in with room left to grow. Meanwhile, a West Vancouver townhouse was already worth over $1 million in 2016.

“Once a market becomes expensive enough, the buyer pool thins, demand weakens, and appreciation slows to a crawl,” Zoocasa wrote.

Meanwhile, markets like Maple Ridge had room to build and sell townhouses at prices that “families could actually reach.”

“As those homes went up, schools, transit, retail, and community centres followed, transforming these neighbourhoods from commuter outposts into places people genuinely wanted to live.”

The quickest path to $2 million

While it’s nearly a two-hour drive from Vancouver, Zoocasa also looked at townhouse prices in Whistler.

Townhouse values rose significantly in the past decade, from $726,700 to $1,646,800 — a whopping $920,100 increase.

“Unlike every other market in this study, it isn’t tied to local wages or commutes to the office. International luxury capital, vacation rentals, and secondary-home demand drive prices there, and it’s just two years from a $2-million average. It functions less like a housing market and more like a global equity asset,” wrote Zoocasa.