Video taking off 14x its usual first day

Vancouver's record pile of empty condos meets Eby's tax warning

A two-minute CBC report walks past a half-empty luxury tower and asks why so much supply has not brought prices down.

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CBC British Columbia Story of October 14, 2026Trari Newsroom

Why this story? The video opened at a pace of 74,202 views a day, 14 times a normal first day on this channel (5,210).

More than $4B worth of condos sitting empty in Vancouver

The tower is finished, and many of its units are empty. CBC reporter Tanya Fletcher opens the report outside a newly completed luxury high-rise with developer and real estate consultant Michael Geller, who calls it "one of the most high-profile developments in Vancouver."

Geller's explanation is about timing. When these projects began, he says, "things were very buoyant, there was a lot of optimism," but new government taxes and a changed economy have arrived since. Graphics then show how many units sit unsold in buildings in Burnaby and Coquitlam, and Fletcher explains why developers cannot simply slash prices: their lenders and the value of the buildings tie their hands.

The headline figure comes next. Metro Vancouver's unsold condo stock hit a record of about 5,400 units in June, roughly $4.5 billion of homes waiting for buyers.

In the middle of a provincial election, that inventory has become a campaign issue. B.C. NDP leader David Eby has a blunt message for developers: "If you don't sell these units in the next year, we will impose a tax on you," with a 2 percent levy on the table.

The short report drew about 74,000 views in its first day, roughly fourteen times what a Short on this channel usually manages, and far ahead of the channel's other campaign coverage, including questions to Eby about his family's $10-a-day child care.

Simon Fraser University's Andy Yan gets the last word in the video, and it is the uncomfortable one: all that stock has not moved prices toward what local incomes can afford.

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