People walk through Civic Plaza outside the City Centre branch of the Surrey Library in Surrey, B.C., in March, 2025.Isabella Falsetti/The Globe and Mail
The Globe and Mail’s 2026 ranking of the most renter-friendly cities in the country showed that those willing to take a chance on Saskatchewan may discover an easier life. But if they’re set on the Vancouver area, renters may find that rising star Surrey seals the deal.
The suburban city led our regional ranking, which looked at the Vancouver Census Metropolitan Area (CMA), including 14 communities in the area, along with Vancouver itself. Located south of the Fraser River, Surrey scored the highest overall ranking when comparing affordability, availability, stability and livability.
Manraj Dosanjh, a Fraser Valley-area realtor with Dexter Realty, said the ranking reflects the trend of new developments popping up along transit corridors in the region, with both Surrey and New Westminster (ranked second overall) coming in as two solid options east of downtown Vancouver.
The area has seen “a lot more new development along these transit-oriented neighbourhoods because there’s been a lot of attention put on building high density near SkyTrains,” said Mr. Dosanjh, a real estate adviser who helps investors hoping to become landlords purchase properties.
Although Surrey placed fifth on affordability with an average asking rent of $2,235, the weight of the other ranking categories, such as availability, pushed it to the top spot.
Mr. Dosanjh said that if renters are content with a slightly longer commute to the urban core, it offers them a chance to be a part of a university-centric, emerging community.
“Surrey is a city of opportunity. We’re still building the city that the next generation is going to inherit. So, there’s a lot of new growth coming to it, and you feel like you’re a part of it. There’s a much younger vibe there,” he said.
As for where the rental market is heading, Mr. Dosanjh said he believes some of the price decreases in Vancouver can be attributed to slowing immigration. “And that’s not just affecting one city; it’s across the region,” he said.
Rentals.ca communication director Giacomo Ladas also said that average asking rents in many Vancouver-area cities are some of the lowest they’ve been over the past three or four years.
“Now, they’re still extremely expensive, but Vancouver is always going to be an expensive place to live,” he said. “It’s just one of those things about it. It’s an international draw.”
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Bella Taylor recently gave in to the appeal of city life. She moved from the suburb of Ladner, in Delta, to the Kitsilano neighbourhood in the city of Vancouver at the beginning of July. The 27-year-old full-time student and support worker lives with her partner, who works as a mechanical engineer, and their Rottweiler mix named Kyo.
“We had been looking to move out for probably about a year, and just trying to like find the perfect place and trying to find something that’s affordable. And yeah, we definitely did notice the prices dropping a little bit,” she said.
The average price of rent in the city of Vancouver from March to May was $2,844. That’s compared with $3,093 during the same period in 2025.
The couple, who required a place that was pet-friendly and quiet, settled on a 650-square-foot, one-bedroom, one-bath unit on the top floor of a three-storey building for $2,300 a month.
“We nearly chose a place that was actually $1,750 that was pet friendly, but it was worth it for us to have a little bit more comfort because the walls were very thin and the balcony was rotting and it was very loud,” she said.
With data and a report from Mahima Singh