Churches Are So Scarce in Toronto and Vancouver That ‘The Sky’s the Limit’ on Price

• Church buildings in Vancouver and Toronto were commanding premium prices in 2016
• Around 90% of churches handled by two Vancouver realtors sold to other faith groups
• One former Salvation Army building sold for $15 million to a Buddhist group
• Immigrant congregations were a major source of demand

Canada’s two hottest property markets were turning church buildings into some of the most sought-after real estate around, the Anglican Journal reported in August 2016. Specialist agents in Vancouver and Toronto described a market where supply is tiny and buyers, many of them faith communities formed by newcomers, are plentiful.

In Vancouver, realtors Leonardo Di Francesco and Rav Rampuri have built a niche selling church property. They told the Journal that roughly nine in ten of the churches they handle go to other religious organisations rather than developers. At the time they had a Burnaby property on the market for $8.8 million: about 10,000 square feet with two sanctuaries on an acre of land. Their biggest deal was a 40,000-square-foot Salvation Army building that went for $15 million to a Buddhist group and was by then thought to be worth around $25 million.

In the Greater Toronto Area, agent John Morrison works the same specialist market, and converted church homes carry their own premium: a church condo in Rosedale was listed at $3.95 million.

The agents pointed to two forces. Booming prices in both cities made any large, well-located site valuable, and immigration kept creating new congregations looking for somewhere to worship. The Journal cited a 2015 Angus Reid survey that found 35% of foreign-born Canadians attend religious services, against 21% of those born in Canada. “Because it’s so rare, the sky’s the limit,” Di Francesco said. “Within reason. Not 100 million, but 20, 30 million [dollars] is not unreasonable.”

For Jamaican and wider Caribbean congregations in Canada, the lesson is that a church building is now a serious property asset rather than simply a place to meet. Diaspora churches that rent halls or storefronts are competing with other faith groups and deep-pocketed buyers for the few purpose-built sanctuaries that come up. Congregations that already own their buildings, in Canada or back home in Jamaica, hold something that is hard to replace, which makes careful stewardship, clear title and long-term planning far more important than a quick sale.

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