British Columbia
It goes without saying, any extreme weather and/or economic downturn experienced in the Prairies would also affect this British Columbia. For instance, parts of this province experienced above-normal winter and spring temperatures and in May, a large number of the province’s groundwater wells were below seasonal levels. For the second year in a row, unseasonably dry and hot weather saw various regions in the province enforce level-four drought conditions which prevented homeowners from filling their pools.
Although pool permits increased by almost 50 per cent in 2015 despite many of the same conditions, the market showed it could not sustain this growth in 2016. Although last year’s pool permit registrations between January and June kept pace with the previous season, the bottom fell out during the second half of the season, dropping 63 per cent year-over-year.
Despite the calamities suffered in this region, Vancouver grew by 32 per cent after a slight increase in 2015. In fact, this CMA held strong throughout the year, with permit increases in three of four quarters.
The only other CMA in this province to record an increase in permits was Abbotsford-Mission. Unfortunately, after the market turned around in Kelowna in 2015 by 73.5 per cent (243 permits), pool installations in this CMA fell by 26 per cent last year. As a result, Kelowna moved from first on the list of top five major urban centres with increased building permits in 2015 to first on the list of total number of decreased permits in 2016. However, this CMA is still performing 29 per cent better than its average between 2008 and 2014. Overall, the province experienced a 1.8 per cent decrease in pool installations in 2016.
British Columbia represents 4.5 per cent of the total number of building permits issued in the country’s CMAs, which is a decrease of 1.2 per cent over 2015.
