How to check building permits for a Vancouver address
Figures from City of Vancouver open data, October 21, 2026.
The City of Vancouver publishes every building permit it has issued since 2017 as open data. Our pages hold 50,177 of them, matched to their address: 24,649 additions or alterations, 11,370 new buildings and 7,045 demolitions.
79,918 of the city’s 109,488 addresses (73%) have no permit at all since 2017. That is not a warning by itself: most houses do not have major work in ten years.
How to read a permit
- The type: new building, addition or alteration, demolition. A demolition followed by a new building means the house was rebuilt.
- The project value declared on the permit, often lower than the real cost.
- The description: kitchen, basement suite, deck, roof.
What permits do not tell you
Work before 2017 is not in the open data, and an issued permit does not prove the work passed its final inspection. Work done without a permit appears nowhere. More about permits
What to ask the seller
- Permits and final inspections for all the work you can see.
- For a basement suite: is it permitted, and since when?
- For work before 2017: the City can provide the property file on request.
General information, not legal or professional advice.