According to CPABC’s latest BC Check-Up: Live survey results,* affordable housing—specifically, the lack thereof—continues to be one of the greatest challenges faced by BC businesses, with 79% of CPA respondents citing housing prices as an obstacle to business success. While this percentage marks a decline from 86% in 2024, it still represents a significant majority of respondents. In fact, only tariffs and trade restrictions ranked higher than housing affordability as a challenge in 2025, coming in at 83%. The ability to attract and retain skilled labour (71%) and labour compensation (69%) rounded out the top four.
Many respondents also expressed a pessimistic outlook on the future cost of housing, with 44% expecting affordability to worsen in their region over the next 12 months. On a positive note, however, this marked an improvement over the results from last year, when 61% of respondents said they anticipated a deepening crisis. Similarly, the percentage of respondents who said they expect housing affordability to improve over the coming year increased from 8% in 2024 to 16% in 2025, indicating a slight increase in optimism. The remaining 40% said they expect it to stay the same, up from 31% last year.
For the first time, members were asked if they were seriously considering leaving British Columbia due to the cost of housing. While 64% of respondents disagreed with this statement, approximately 28% agreed, and the remaining 8% said they were unsure. Notably, CPAs who’d held their designation for less than 10 years were more likely to say they were considering a move out of province.
Ultimately, these results highlight the need to further increase the housing supply and boost real incomes in the province.
A closer look at the results
*CPABC conducted a web-based survey of CPA members across BC to solicit their thoughts on the province’s current and future economic situation and on their current workplace environment. A total of 457 survey responses were received between April 9 and April 30, 2025, which represents an overall response rate of 7%.
For more on this topic, read Life in BC: Trade war fears shake up housing market.
Jack Blackwell is CPABC’s economist.
This article was originally published in the July/August 2025 issue of CPABC in Focus.
