Canadian building permits fall 4.1% as multi-unit plans weaken
Thunder Bay ON – National News Service – The value of Canadian building permits fell 4.1 per cent to $12.9 billion in September, with weaker multi-unit residential plans accounting for most of the national decline, Statistics Canada reported Thursday.
Residential permit values dropped $475.7 million, or 5.8 per cent, to $7.8 billion. The multi-family component fell $529.3 million to $5.1 billion, while single-family intentions rose $53.6 million to $2.7 billion.
British Columbia and Alberta led the multi-unit decline. Ontario drove the increase in single-family permits, adding $103.3 million.
Industrial gains soften the non-residential decline
Non-residential permit values slipped $77.1 million to $5.1 billion. Institutional intentions fell $171.5 million to $1.6 billion, more than offsetting a $90.9-million increase in industrial permits to $1.3 billion.
Ontario’s industrial component rose $299.2 million, the largest provincial contribution to the gain. Overall permit values in Ontario increased 6.6 per cent to $5.3 billion in September, while values fell in Quebec, Manitoba, Saskatchewan, Alberta and British Columbia.
Permit values measure construction intentions when municipalities issue permits. They are not the same as construction starts, money already spent or completed buildings, and a single large project can move monthly totals.
Third-quarter pipeline was smaller
For the third quarter, total permit values decreased 3.6 per cent to $38.8 billion in current dollars. Statistics Canada then used constant 2023 dollars for its sector analysis and found that non-residential intentions fell $1.7 billion to $13.8 billion, the largest quarterly decrease since the second quarter of 2020.
Residential intentions were almost unchanged in constant dollars at $21 billion. Municipalities authorized 71,300 residential units during the quarter, not seasonally adjusted, down from 78,500 in the same period a year earlier.
The figures point to a softer national pipeline, especially for multi-unit and institutional work, but they do not show a uniform slowdown. Ontario’s monthly gains in single-family and industrial permits provide one counterweight. The next building-permit release, covering October, is scheduled for Dec. 11.
Source notes
– Statistics Canada building permits, September 2026. Released Nov. 12, 2026 at 8:30 a.m. ET; monthly and quarterly figures checked Nov. 13
– Statistics Canada 2026 release schedule. Next building-permit release date verified Nov. 13
