Victoria indicatorsAll measures Business and jobs
Downtown office vacancy rate
13% of office space
No target expected. This is a context measure. A market vacancy rate reported by a commercial real estate firm. No government sets a target for it. Targets and comparisons
Down 0.3 points since Jan–Mar 2026.
Source: City of Victoria (Colliers data). We read it on Nov 12, 2026.
Over time
Apr–Jun 2026 Of office space, by quarter
- 13% of office space
Targets and comparisons
Context measure: no target expected
Context measure: no target expected. A market vacancy rate reported by a commercial real estate firm. No government sets a target for it.
Show the numbers as a table
| Period | Value |
|---|---|
| Apr–Jun 2026 | 13% |
| Jan–Mar 2026 | 13.3% |
Who decides
No government decides this directly. The bodies below decide the rules around it.
Show all 1 bodies and the laws
No government decides this directly. Building owners and businesses decide leases.
| Body | What it decides | Law or bylaw |
|---|---|---|
| City of Victoria Council | Decides zoning and development permits, and regulates building by bylaw. | Local Government Act, s. 479 Local Government Act, s. 490 Community Charter, s. 8 (3) (l) |
Councils: last general local election October 17, 2026; next on October 19, 2030, the third Saturday of October set by the Local Government Act, s. 52.
Each row says what a body decides and links to the law, order or bylaw that gives it that role. It does not say who caused a change: markets, households and other governments also move these numbers. Who decides what, for every measure · How we choose
What this number does not show
- The City of Victoria republishes this rate in its quarterly economic dashboard and credits it to Colliers, a commercial real estate firm (“SOURCE: Colliers Office Report”). Colliers is not a public body. No public body publishes downtown office vacancy, so this source is used, with this note.
One more limit
- Each dashboard gives the current quarter only, not the same quarter a year earlier, so the comparison is with the quarter before. Office vacancy can move with the seasons less than retail does, but a quarter is a short time.
Not measured yet in business and jobs: empty storefronts downtown, cleanliness and needle pick-up requests. See all 18 gaps
In plain words
The share of downtown office space that is vacant, as the City’s quarterly economic dashboard reports it from Colliers, a commercial real estate firm.
How we decide “About the same”
The change is 2.3% of the earlier value, below the 5% threshold.
A lower vacancy rate means more downtown offices are in use. 13% in Q2 2026, against 13.3% in Q1 2026 (the quarter before), as printed in the City’s economic dashboards (source: Colliers Office Q2 Report).
Outcome measures read Better, Worse or About the same; published government targets read Ahead of, On or Behind target; value-judgement measures read Rising, Falling or Steady in a neutral colour. A change smaller than the agency's own margin of error, or otherwise smaller than 5% of the earlier value, is About the same (or Steady). No change is calculated across a marked break in a series. The rule.
All notes on this number
Why it matters. Empty offices mean fewer workers downtown for shops and restaurants.
- The City of Victoria republishes this rate in its quarterly economic dashboard and credits it to Colliers, a commercial real estate firm (“SOURCE: Colliers Office Report”). Colliers is not a public body. No public body publishes downtown office vacancy, so this source is used, with this note.
- Each dashboard gives the current quarter only, not the same quarter a year earlier, so the comparison is with the quarter before. Office vacancy can move with the seasons less than retail does, but a quarter is a short time.
- Storefront (retail) vacancy is not published as a rate by any public body; the dashboard gives only the quarterly change in retail availability (from CBRE). It stays on “What is missing”.
Which places
Area: Downtown Victoria
The City of Victoria’s Downtown neighbourhood only.
Included
- The Downtown neighbourhood as drawn on the City of Victoria’s official neighbourhood map
Not included
- Every other City neighbourhood (for example James Bay, Fairfield, North Park and Burnside)
- All other municipalities
Official definition
How the agency describes it: Downtown Victoria.
How we got it
This number is published by the agency as shown; it is not calculated here. The script reads it from the agency’s own document and refuses to show it unless the expected text is found.
Licence and credits
This figure is public but not under an open licence: the agency publishes it for anyone to read, and it is shown here with credit and a link to the agency’s terms. About licences.
- Licence
- Public data, not under an open licence. Used with attribution. Agency’s terms of use
- Updated by agency
- Quarterly (City economic dashboard); latest release Aug 21, 2026 (date of the agency’s file)
- Retrieved
- Nov 12, 2026, 10:28 PM B.C. time
Source: City of Victoria, Victoria's Economic Dashboard, Q2 2026 (Colliers Office Q2 Report). Public document, used with attribution; not endorsed by the publisher.
Spot a mistake?
Email [email protected]. Fixes are listed in the corrections log.