Renovation prices in Canada are still climbing — up 2.3% over the past year across the 15 major markets tracked by Statistics Canada’s Residential Renovation Price Index, released August 7. But the national average hides the real story: Quebec City renovations got 7.1% more expensive, while Vancouver prices barely moved at all. If you’re planning a project, where you live now shapes your budget as much as what you’re building — and a quieter booking market underneath those numbers is quietly handing homeowners more leverage than they’ve had in years.
What the New Numbers Say
Statistics Canada’s index tracks what contractors charge for the same basket of common renovation work — kitchens, bathrooms, roofing, flooring — across 15 metropolitan areas. The second-quarter reading, reported by Canadian Mortgage Trends, shows:
| Market | Renovation price change (year over year) |
|---|---|
| Quebec City | +7.1% |
| Victoria | +5.3% |
| Halifax | +4.8% |
| National (15 markets) | +2.3% |
| Toronto | +1.0% |
| Vancouver | ~0% (essentially unchanged) |
Prices also rose 0.7% from the first quarter, with gains in most markets — so this isn’t a one-off blip. Renovating keeps getting more expensive, just far more slowly than during the 2021–2023 surge.
Why Quebec City Is Up 7% While Vancouver Is Flat
The spread comes down to local labour markets. Smaller markets like Quebec City and Halifax have tighter trades supply — fewer available crews mean less competition on quotes, so rising labour costs pass straight through to homeowners. In Toronto and Vancouver, a slower housing market has left more contractors competing for fewer big projects, which keeps quoted prices honest even though the contractors’ own costs haven’t dropped.
That’s worth sitting with: flat prices in Canada’s two biggest metros don’t mean renovating got cheaper to deliver. It means contractors there are absorbing cost increases to stay competitive — a signal of how much slack is in the market.
A Softer Market Underneath the Higher Prices
Canada’s renovation industry entered 2026 with slower growth, stretched household budgets, and — critically for anyone hiring — more contractor availability than at any point since the pandemic boom. Homeowners are delaying projects, and many contractors are seeing fewer bookings, a squeeze we covered from the US side when renovation budgets started shrinking earlier this summer.
Rising prices on top of soft demand sounds contradictory, but it isn’t: labour agreements and material costs set a floor under what contractors must charge, while slow bookings determine how much negotiating room sits above that floor. Right now that room is unusually wide.
What Homeowners Should Do This Fall
If a project is on your list, the late-2026 shoulder season is a genuinely good window:
- Get at least three quotes. With pipelines quieter, contractors respond faster and price sharper than they did a year ago. Posting your project and budget and letting pros come to you flips the usual dynamic.
- Mind your local index. In Quebec City, Victoria, or Halifax, waiting is actively costing you — a $40,000 kitchen remodel priced at Quebec City’s 7.1% pace gets roughly $2,800 more expensive in a year. In Toronto or Vancouver, you have more time to plan.
- Don’t wait for rate cuts to bring everyone else back. If borrowing costs keep easing into 2027, delayed projects will crowd back in — and today’s negotiating room disappears. We looked at the stay-and-improve math in Renovate or Move?
What It Means for Local Pros
For contractors, the index is a mirror: in flat markets, winning work is now a speed and clarity game — the first complete, itemized quote usually takes the job. In the fast-rising markets, the risk is the opposite: underquoting long projects while labour costs climb 5–7% annually. Either way, locking in work this fall at clearly scoped prices beats gambling on the spring market.
Planning a renovation and want to see what it actually costs in your market? Post your project as a quest with your budget and get competing offers from identity-verified pros — free for homeowners. Get quotes on MastersGuild
