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Foreclosure listings in Calgary nearly doubled in the past year, and summer 2026 ran close to triple. Here is what the numbers say and what we tell buyers and owners.

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Local Legends is a short series about Calgary businesses we actually use. Not sponsors. Not a directory. Places one of us has a real history with, where there is a person to name and something specific to order. We run one a month in our newsletter and keep them here so they do not disappear.

Metrovino, 722 11 Avenue SW

There is a magical place in the Beltline, tucked between Noble Pie and The Cook Book Co., that has been serving Calgary some of the best wine imports for thirty years. Opening in 1996, Metrovino feels like stepping into the shop of a European wine merchant.

Josh worked here part-time in 2006 and 2007 while earning his sommelier diploma, and Al, Richard and the crew are still the reason we buy our wine there. The team is exceptionally warm, they hold an enormous amount of knowledge, and they have kept their finger on the pulse of world-class wine for three decades. The French shelves are the heart of the shop, from Burgundy through to smaller regions like the Jura and the Loire.

This is not a conglomerate wine store, and the shelves and the service prove it. They are fantastic at hearing what you are shopping for and finding the bottle that fits the meal, the event, or the mood. They even selected Josh and Alena’s wedding wine.

Go say hi and tell them Josh sent you. We dare you to walk out without a bottle.

Metrovino · 722 11 Avenue SW, Calgary · Our Instagram post about the shop

Why a real estate team writes about a wine shop

When clients ask what daily life actually feels like in the inner city, we rarely start with market stats. We start with the places. The wine shop that knows your name. The market where dinner sorts itself out on a Tuesday. The coffee bar where half the neighbourhood lines up on Saturday morning. Those are the things that make a street worth paying for, and they never show up on a listing sheet.

If you are weighing up where in Calgary to live, our community guides cover the streets, the prices and the trade-offs. This series covers the rest.

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Thinking about a move inside the inner city? A free home evaluation is the place to start, or get in touch and we will talk it through.

Honest answer: it depends on what you are buying. Condo and townhouse buyers in Calgary have more choice and more room to negotiate than they have had in years, while the inner-city detached market is still competitive, especially above $1 million (CREB, as of August 2026).

We get this question more than any other, and the one-size-fits-all version of the answer is almost useless. Broad strokes only work in horseshoes and hand grenades. So here is the granular answer, with the numbers behind it.

The quick version

• Two markets in one city: inner-city detached homes sold in a median of 22 days at 95.8 per cent of original list price in August. Condos took 44 days and closed at 93.3 per cent (MLS sales data via Pillar 9, August 2026).
• Prices are levelling, not falling: the citywide benchmark held at $569,800 in August, down just 1.08 per cent from a year ago, the smallest gap since prices started easing (CREB, as of August 2026).
• Condos are effectively on sale: depending on the area, condo prices are down roughly 6 to 10 per cent over the last twelve months, and condos make up 56 per cent of what is still for sale in the inner city.
• Detached is quietly strengthening: inner-city detached prices rose 2.24 per cent year over year to $995,700, and the median inner-city detached sale crossed the million mark at $1,010,000 (CREB, as of August 2026; Pillar 9).
• Our supply rule of thumb: around 3.5 months is balanced, under 3 favours sellers, over 4 favours buyers. Calgary sits at 3.92 months right now.
• Waiting has a price too: six months of rent to maybe save $10,000 on a purchase is usually a wash at best.

That covers the numbers. The rest of this post is how we actually walk clients through the decision.

Why we answer this question with a question

When someone asks us if now is a good time to buy, the first thing we ask back is: what are you looking to buy? A detached home or an apartment? What part of the city, and what price range?

The more granular we get, the better the answer. A first-time buyer looking at a Kensington apartment and a family shopping for a detached infill in Marda Loop are in two completely different markets right now, even though both are “buying in Calgary.” One has dozens of options and real leverage. The other should walk into their first showing ready to move quickly.

And honestly, the market is only half the question. Where you are at in your life matters just as much. Markets go up and down, but that does not put the rest of your life on hold. Growing family, new job, aging parents, a relationship starting or ending. You do what is right for your family, your situation, and your circumstances, and then we figure out how to make the market work for that.

What is the Calgary market actually doing right now?

August was quiet on both sides of the table. Citywide sales were down 16 per cent from last August, but new listings fell too, because sellers who did not need to move stayed put. Through all of that, the benchmark price held at $569,800 (CREB, as of August 2026). Prices are not falling. They are levelling.

The inner city kept its two speeds. Detached homes sold in a median of 22 days at 95.8 per cent of original list. Semi-detached was close behind at 25 days. Condos took 44 days and closed at 93.3 per cent of original list, and while they were 39 per cent of inner-city sales, they were 56 per cent of what is still for sale (MLS sales data via Pillar 9, August 2026).

One shift worth naming: inner-city detached prices rose 2.24 per cent year over year, and west Calgary detached turned positive too, at 2.78 per cent (CREB, as of August 2026). The strength is spreading, not shrinking.

Here is what we are seeing on the ground this fall, by property type:

• Detached: tight, especially inner city. Anything over $1 million is competitive, and the $1.5 million to $3 million range is very competitive.
• Semi-detached: pretty stable, particularly in the $800,000 to $1.1 million range.
• Row townhouses: not as soft as apartments, but slowing, with inventory building.
• Apartments: a tonne of supply. Buyers are choosy, and even well-priced units that look like great deals can sit.

We publish a detailed version of this every month for each inner-city community, with our honest take on every one. You can find it on our Calgary real estate market update page.

How do you read months of supply?

Months of supply is the most useful single number for the timing question. Our rule of thumb: around three and a half months is balanced. Under three months, sellers generally have the upper hand. Over four, buyers do. Calgary as a whole sits at 3.92 months right now, which means buyers have more room than they did in spring (CREB, as of August 2026).

But we never stop at the citywide number. We look at the community: are listings selling in the first few days with multiple offers over asking, or are we seeing longer days on market and price cuts before the final sale? Then we look at the listing itself. A hot community does not save an overpriced house, and a balanced market does not mean every well-priced home has room to negotiate.

Should I wait for prices to drop more?

In our experience, you cannot time the market, and waiting usually costs more than acting.

Here is the math we walk renters through. Say you wait six months hoping prices come down another $10,000. If your rent is $1,700 a month, you will spend about $10,000 in rent over those same six months, money that could have been going toward your own principal. Best case, you broke even. And that assumes prices actually dropped, which the August data suggests is no longer the trend for most property types.

Rates work the same way. Waiting for the perfect rate usually means watching a string of great houses go to someone else. If rates feel high, talk to your broker about a shorter one or two year term, buy the right house now, and revisit the rate at renewal. Our mortgage calculator is a quick way to see what different rates and terms do to a monthly payment.

Mostly, though, we come back to the same thing: do what is best for your family, your finances, and your timing. The market will do what it does either way.

Is now a good time to buy a condo in Calgary?

The headlines about condo oversupply scare a lot of people off. We read it the other way. Condos are a huge part of this market, and right now they are essentially on sale, at prices we have not seen in years.

Just this past weekend we worked with clients downsizing from a bungalow into their first condo. Condo prices in the areas they were shopping are down 6 to 10 per cent over the last twelve months, while the bungalow they are selling sits in a much more stable market. They sell into strength and buy into softness. For them, the timing was about as good as it gets.

There is another side to it, of course. If you bought a condo in the last few years and need to sell, it can be a tough conversation. If you have owned yours for a decade or more, you have probably still done quite well. We covered how this supply wave built up in our earlier post on Calgary’s record condo supply, and most of that opportunity is still on the table.

We are watching this play out on our own listings. Some have sat for months, and not because they show poorly or because the price is wrong. Buyers simply have that much choice, and in a few pockets it has turned into a race to the bottom. Our rule of thumb for sellers has become: offer a little more for a little less. The condo or townhouse has to give a buyer something the recent sales did not, and it has to come in under them on price. Turn that around and it is the whole case for buying a condo this fall, because the seller is the one who has to bend.

One caveat, and we give it to every client whether they are buying a condo or a house. Plan to hold it for at least five years. Condos in particular can run up in price and give it all back inside a short window, and Calgary has lived through both halves of that cycle in the last five years. Before you write on any condo, know what the document review and the closing costs on a Calgary condo actually involve.

What softer rents change

Rent has come down, and that shifts the math for anyone weighing renting against buying.

Average asking rents in Calgary were down about 4.5 per cent year over year in July 2026, a steeper drop than the national average of 4.0 per cent (Rentals.ca National Rent Report, August 2026). CMHC put Calgary’s apartment vacancy rate at 5.0 per cent for 2025 against a national rate of 3.1 per cent, after purpose-built rental supply grew 11 per cent in a single year. That was the fastest pace in decades.

Most of that is supply. Calgary set a record for new home construction in 2025 and a large share of it was rental, so a wave of new units is hitting the market at once. Demand has shifted as well, though not in the way most people assume. Alberta still leads the country in net interprovincial migration and has for fifteen straight quarters. What has fallen is international migration, driven by net outflows of non-permanent residents, and that group rents far more often than it buys.

Cheaper rent is not a reason to give up on owning. It is a reason to be honest about your timeline. If renting costs less than owning today and you are not confident you will stay five years, renting is the better financial answer for now.

When we tell people not to buy

A friend of Josh’s reached out this year wanting to buy his first place. Good savings, stable job, everything lined up on paper. But he was not sure he wanted to stay in Canada long term, he had travel plans, and he was in an inexpensive rental he loved. The advice: keep the rental, save your money, go travel, and buy when you are back. There is no point being locked into a property you are not here to live in, and managing a tenant from another continent is nobody’s idea of fun.

We have the same honest conversations with sellers. This year we have told more than one owner that the price they need is simply not where the market is, shown them the recent sale data, and suggested they place a tenant instead of listing. We would rather lose a listing than market an overpriced one.

How we actually decide with clients

By the time a client of ours writes an offer, the timing question has usually answered itself. The process looks like this:

• Discovery first: we get clear on motivation, budget, timeline, and what the home needs to do for you.
• Learn from every no: when a property is not the right one, we dig into why, so we stop showing you homes with the same dealbreaker.
• Evaluate before offering: recent comparables, how the home is priced against them, days on market, and a direct conversation with the listing agent about disclosures and anything we could not see at the showing.
• Structure the whole offer: price matters, but so do possession timing, deposit, conditions, terms, and inclusions. A good offer is its own strategy, built for that listing and that level of competition.

Buy now or wait, by situation

Your situation	Lean toward buying now	Lean toward waiting
Detached or semi in the inner city, northwest or west	The home fits and the payments work at today’s rate	You are not pre-approved, or you still have a home to sell
Apartment condo	You will hold it five years or more and the building checks out	You may need to sell inside two years, or the documents are messy
Row home or townhouse	You want inner-city access and detached is out of reach	You can stretch to a semi and would rather have the land
First-time buyer still renting	Your five-year plan is stable and the payment is comfortable	Your work or household situation is still moving

So, is now a good time to buy in Calgary?

If you are shopping for a condo or townhouse in Calgary’s inner city, you have not had this many options or this much negotiating room in years. If you are buying detached between $1.5 million and $3.5 million in the inner city, be prepared to compete, and be prepared to play to win.

Everything in between depends on the property, the community, and where you are at in life. If you have a home to sell first, start with a free home evaluation so you know your real budget before you fall for a listing. If you are buying your first place, our first-time home buyer guide for Calgary walks through the path. If you want the granular answer for your situation, reach out and we will walk through the numbers with you.

Frequently asked questions about buying in Calgary right now

A past client called us this spring about his grandparents’ house in Westgate. He asked if we would sit down with his parents.

His grandparents bought 24 Westwood Crescent SW new and moved in in 1960, the year after it was built. They never moved again. His father grew up in that house. Three generations of the family spent time in it. Sixty-six years later it had still never been listed for sale.

His parents were the executors of the estate, which made them our clients.

The house

It was a bungalow, but a big one for its era. Just under 1,400 square feet, two bedrooms up and two down, on a 5,468 square foot lot on a quiet crescent facing green space. Hardwood under the carpet in places.

The part that surprised us was the addition. Someone built it in the mid-1980s on a proper concrete foundation, with its own furnace and its own basement underneath. That is not what you usually find when you go looking at a 1980s addition on a 1950s bungalow. Usually you find a sunroom on piles and a list of problems. This one had been done properly, and it added real square footage and real value.

The rest of the house had been maintained the way people maintained things in that generation. Not renovated. Maintained.

What was inside it

The house was full. Sixty-six years of one family.

His grandfather built a lot of the furniture in that house. His grandmother painted it. Those pieces had been sitting in those rooms longer than most houses in Westgate have had their current owners.

We brought in Tara, of Staged by Tara, who does our staging. Her job was not to empty the place out. It was to thin it down without taking away the reason someone would fall in love with it. There is a version of staging that scrubs a house like this into something anonymous, and it does not work. Buyers can tell. Tara took out enough that a buyer could see the rooms, and left enough that the house still felt like itself.

The family made all the hard calls about what stayed and what did not. We just made sure they were not making those calls on our schedule.

The price

This is the part I would tell another agent about.

The family wanted to list lower. Their reasoning was fair. It was an older home, it had not been updated, and they did not want it sitting.

I pushed for a higher number. Not because of a comparable sale or a formula, but because of what the house actually was. The green space out front, the addition done right, the size of the lot, and the feeling you got walking in the door. Charm is not a line item on a market analysis, but it is real, and buyers pay for it when a house has it.

We listed at $675,000. It sold in one day.

I am not telling you that to make a point about us. One day is not a strategy. It happened because the house was prepared properly first and then priced to what it was worth rather than to what everyone was nervous about. If we had listed where the family first wanted to, it probably would have sold in one day too, and they would have left money on the table.

The listing is still up if you want to see how it showed.

If you are in this position

Most of the calls we get like this come from the grandchild or the adult child, not the owner. A few things that help:

Start before you have to. The families that come out of this well are the ones who talked about it a year early instead of three weeks after a funeral.

Do not renovate on reflex. The instinct is to fix everything. Most of that money does not come back. We went through what actually returns its cost in our guide to renovating before selling in Calgary.

Get the paperwork out of a drawer early. Permits, the Real Property Report, whatever records exist for the furnace and the roof. On a house this age, buyers will ask, and having answers is worth more than you would think.

And if the sale is funding somebody’s next move, look at that next move before you list. We wrote both downsizing in Calgary and rightsizing in Calgary for exactly that conversation.

One more thing

I have sold a lot of houses in Calgary. This one I think about.

A couple bought a house new, raised their kids in it, kept it for sixty-six years, and then the end of it got handed to their grandson’s realtor. He did not have to call us. He did, and that is worth more to me than the commission was.

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Selling a home that has been in your family for decades, or helping parents work through the decision? A free home evaluation is the place to start, or get in touch and we will talk through what it actually involves.

Our commission is higher than the Calgary standard. Most listings here follow a 7 and 3 structure. Ours is 8% on the first $100,000 and 3% on the balance, a difference of exactly $1,000 regardless of price. And more than 75% of our business still comes from repeat clients and referrals.

That only makes sense if the fee nets you more than it costs. We think a commission should work like an investment in your own property, not a fee for selling it. This post is our honest case, including the math critics use and the cases where you don’t need us at all.

The quick version

• The typical structure: most Calgary listing commissions run 7% on the first $100,000 and 3% on the rest, split between the listing and buyer sides. Ours is 8 and 3, exactly $1,000 more on any sale. On a $700,000 sale that is $26,000 total, about 3.7%, and the effective rate falls as the price rises.
• The only test that matters: a commission is justified when the net result exceeds the fee. Hiring us should leave more money in your pocket, net, or we have not earned it.
• The fee is the whole fee: no transaction fees, no admin costs, no document processing charges added on top.
• Commissions are negotiable: in Alberta they always have been, and we’ve reduced ours when a seller was under real financial pressure.
• Buyers usually pay nothing directly: in roughly 95% of sales the buyer’s agent is paid from the seller’s side, and the amount is disclosed on every listing.
• The information is free: we give our full plan away at the first meeting. What you’re paying for is implementation.

How realtor commission actually works in Calgary

There’s no set rate. Every commission in Alberta is negotiable, and structures vary by brokerage (Real Estate Council of Alberta). The common convention is a declining structure: a higher percentage on the first $100,000 and a lower one on the balance, shared between the two sides of the deal.

Critics online point out that 7 and 3 works out to roughly 3.5% of a $700,000 sale, and they’re right. Here’s the part that rarely gets explained: the structure is designed to fall as the price rises. The first $100,000 carries the costs that are the same on every listing, including photography, video, staging, marketing and transaction management. Only the balance scales with the stakes. On our 8 and 3 structure, a $500,000 sale runs about 4%, a $900,000 sale about 3.6%, and a $1.5 million sale about 3.3%.

Against the common 7 and 3, ours is $1,000 more, flat, whether the home sells for $400,000 or $1.4 million. On the most expensive asset most people own, we think that’s a small price for having the job done right, reviewed at every step, and off your mind. And the fee is the whole fee: no transaction fees or documentation charges added on top, as some structures in the market do.

The only test that matters

A commission is justified when the net result exceeds the fee. That’s the whole test. Hiring a professional should mean the process is well executed, you have guidance at every decision, and you end up with more money in your pocket, net. If an agent can’t clear that bar, the problem isn’t the commission, it’s who’s earning it.

Everything below is that test applied: why the fee is structured the way it is, what the work looks like when it matters, and the honest cases where the test says don’t hire us.

Why is it a percentage of the price at all?

The fairest version of the objection goes: selling a $900,000 house isn’t twice the work of selling a $450,000 house, so why is the fee twice as large?

Three answers. First, risk scales with price. A 1% pricing mistake is $4,500 on one house and $9,000 on the other, and appraisal shortfalls, failed negotiations and carrying costs scale the same way. Like an estate lawyer or a money manager, we’re not billing hours. We’re taking responsibility for the result on the biggest asset you own.

Second, complexity scales too. Higher-priced homes carry more systems to understand and represent properly: in-slab heating, tankless hot water, home automation, high-end appliances. The buyers of those homes also arrive with higher expectations of the agent across the table.

Third, part of it is simply convention, and conventions are negotiable. We’d rather say that plainly than pretend otherwise.

The information is free. The implementation is not.

Comparable sales, market data and pricing tools used to be the agent’s moat. They aren’t anymore, and we think that’s a good thing. At our first meeting we walk sellers through our entire plan, the Precision Sale Program, and anyone is welcome to take that knowledge and run with it on their own.

Almost nobody does, and the reason isn’t that the information is secret. It’s that a sale is several hundred decisions executed under time pressure: land title and real property report issues, preparation and staging calls, pricing against the right comparables rather than the convenient ones, timing the market, sequencing offers, holding a deal together through conditions. You’re not paying us for what we know. You’re paying for the decisions that get made when the information is incomplete and the clock is running.

A listing agreement looks like a marketing contract, but it’s really a decision-making contract. The photos and the launch are the easy parts, and easy parts can be commoditized. The week-six problems can’t. That’s what the fee buys.

What the fee bought two clients this summer

In June, a buyer’s inspection came back with $10,000 in claimed deficiencies. Most weren’t deficiencies at all. A working eight-year-old hot water tank near the end of its rated life isn’t a defect, it’s a hot water tank. Our sellers were ready to walk away and relist. We pushed back with documentation, agreed the reasonable items were worth about $2,500, and the buyers accepted. The sellers kept their sale and $7,500 that the first draft of that negotiation would have given away.

Also this summer, we listed an estate bungalow in Westgate that the family was happy to sell for $650,000. The recent comparables supported that number, but comparables don’t capture care, and this home had one owner since 1960 and decades of it. We priced at $675,000, staged it to keep the character instead of stripping it, and had an offer near asking on the first day. The family walked away with well over the number they had settled for.

One pricing decision on one bungalow was worth roughly the entire commission. That isn’t unusual. In our infill analysis last week, same-size homes in the same communities sold hundreds of thousands of dollars apart. The spread between average and excellent execution is far larger than any commission. We’re paid to close that spread.

Run the test from earlier on those two files: $7,500 kept in one negotiation, roughly $25,000 found in one pricing decision, against a $26,000 fee on a $700,000 sale. The work paid for itself before counting the marketing and staging, or the deals that don’t go sideways because someone was watching.

What about discount and flat-fee brokerages?

They’re legitimate, and for some sellers the right call. The saving is real, and we won’t pretend otherwise.

The honest comparison is about scope, not competence. A full-service listing includes professional photography and video, a 3D walkthrough, a professional stager, pre-listing preparation, active management of the buyer side and a team running the transaction behind the scenes. Lower-fee models trim some of that by design; it’s how the price gets lower. If your home is simple, correctly priced and in a strong market segment, you may not miss what was trimmed. If your home needs positioning, or the deal develops complications, the gap shows up at exactly the wrong moment. Run the net test here too: a fee that’s one point cheaper but comes with thinner marketing or less negotiating experience can easily cost more than it saves.

Can you just unbundle it and sell yourself?

The sharpest version of the case against us goes: the data is free, so the rest is coordination and paperwork. List flat fee, hire a lawyer, negotiate yourself.

You can, and some people should. Here’s what that plan misses. Sellers are emotional about their own homes, and small disagreements between a buyer and a self-represented seller tank deals a third party would have carried through, just by delivering the message with care and keeping the logistics straight. A lawyer can paper the deal, but deposits, condition timelines and possession mechanics aren’t their daily work. And there’s a quieter problem: buyer’s agents trust a deal less when there’s no licensed professional on the other side of it. We’ve seen self-represented sellers overprice, sit, and eventually sell for less than they would have netted with the commission paid.

When you do not need us

Sometimes people call with the deal already made. A buyer lined up, a price agreed, terms settled. Mostly they need a lawyer, and we say so. We’ve pointed callers in that direction more than once.

This spring, close friends of ours fell in love with a listed home. When the sellers learned the buyers were friends of ours and didn’t want to pay a commission, we stepped out of the deal entirely rather than stand between our friends and their home, and guided them through conditions, deposit and negotiation from the sidelines. We work for our clients. We’re not going to insert ourselves into a deal just to get paid.

Do buyers pay commission in Alberta?

Usually not directly. In roughly 95% of sales, the buyer’s agent is paid from the seller’s side, and the amount is disclosed on every listing, which we verify before showing a property. We sign a buyer brokerage agreement with every client so representation and compensation are in writing from the start; our buyer’s guide covers how that works. In the rare case where a listing offers a reduced fee or none, we tell our buyers before they view it. Commission is one of the few purchase costs that usually isn’t yours; the ones that are, we broke down in our own $900,000 purchase, line by line.

Why higher-end sellers rarely argue the fee

Our clients at higher price points almost never push back on commission, and it’s worth understanding why. They price their own time, they respect a stated fee the way they expect their own to be respected, and they’re buying the certainty that the job is done right without checking the work. They aren’t less careful with money, they’re more careful with bandwidth. That’s the same thing every seller is buying. Some just count it more explicitly.

The one-sentence answer

We’ll give you the knowledge for free. You’re paying us to make it happen: the pricing judgment, the preparation, the negotiation, and the accountability when the transaction gets messy.

If you want to see exactly what the Precision Sale Program includes before you commit to anything, start with a free home evaluation, or reach out through our website and we’ll walk you through the plan. Take it and run with it if you like. Most people ask us to run it instead.

Frequently asked questions about realtor commission in Calgary

No search result can tell you who the best realtor in Calgary is. “Best” depends on your home, your neighbourhood, and what you need from the process. What you can do is choose well. This guide gives you the criteria that separate strong agents from average ones, the red flags that should end an interview, and how to verify what any agent tells you.

We are Art Leslie and Josh Methot. We have been partners since 2016, we sell about 75 homes a year in and around Calgary’s inner city, and more than 75 percent of our business comes from repeat clients and referrals. We wrote this the way we would explain it to a friend: here is what actually matters, whether you hire us or not.

Start with track record, not personality

Most people choose an agent because they liked them in the first meeting. Likeable matters, but it is the last filter, not the first, so start with the evidence.

Ask any agent you are considering for three numbers:

How many homes did you sell in the last 12 months? In Calgary, a full-time agent should be closing at least 10 to 12 transactions a year. Many licensed agents close far fewer. Volume is not everything, but an agent who sells two homes a year is learning on your dime.

What is your list-to-sell ratio? This is the final sale price as a percentage of asking. It tells you whether the agent prices homes accurately or lists high and chases the market down.

What is your average days on market? Compare it to the CREB average for your property type. Faster than average usually means accurate pricing and strong preparation, not luck.

A good agent knows these numbers cold and will share them without hesitation. Hesitation is itself an answer.

Weight neighbourhood knowledge heavily

Calgary is not one market. Bridgeland, Altadore, and Killarney behave differently from each other, and all three behave differently from the suburbs. An agent who mostly works in Cranston can be excellent there and still misprice an inner-city infill by $50,000, because infill lot values, rezoning rules, and buyer pools are their own world.

Ask where the agent’s last ten sales were. If they are scattered across the whole city, ask how they will establish value in your specific community. There should be a concrete answer. Our own focus is the inner city, which is why we publish detailed guides to the communities we work in most.

Look at the process, not the promises

Anyone can promise communication and marketing. Ask them to show you the system.

For sellers: what happens in the first 14 days of a listing? There should be a defined sequence covering preparation, staging advice, photography, launch timing, and a feedback loop after showings. If the plan is “put it on MLS and hold an open house,” keep interviewing.

For buyers: how do they handle a competing-offer situation? How do they evaluate a condo’s document package or an older home’s renovation history? The answer should be specific enough that you could repeat it back.

This is also where a team structure can help. In our case, dedicated transaction support means paperwork and scheduling never wait on a showing to finish. Solo agents can run great processes too. The point is that a process should exist and the agent should be able to describe it.

Read reviews for patterns, not scores

Almost every agent has a good star rating, so the rating itself tells you little. Read 15 or 20 reviews and look for repeated specifics. “Answered every call,” “told us not to buy the first house,” and “handled a tough condition negotiation” are patterns. Vague praise is not. Also check the dates. Twenty reviews spread over eight years is a different signal than twenty from a busy spring.

Verified platforms make this easier. RankMyAgent is connected to realtor.ca and only publishes reviews tied to a completed transaction, so every one of them is a real client. Ours are there if you want to see what repeated specifics look like.

Then verify independently. Every real estate licensee in Alberta is searchable on the RECA website, where you can confirm licence status and any disciplinary history. It takes two minutes and almost nobody does it.

Red flags worth trusting

A few things should end an interview early:

The agent quotes you a noticeably higher price than everyone else, without data to support it. This is called buying the listing. The price comes down later, after you have signed.

They cannot explain their fee. Commission in Alberta is negotiable, and a confident agent can explain exactly what you get for it.

They pressure you to sign anything on the spot. Alberta’s representation agreements are real commitments. A trustworthy agent wants you to read them.

Everything is urgent. Markets have rhythms, but “you must decide tonight” is usually about the agent’s pipeline, not your interests.

Interview at least two agents

Even if you have a referral you trust, interview two or three agents. The comparison is the point, because differences in preparation, market knowledge, and honesty are hard to see in isolation and obvious side by side. We keep a full list of questions in our guide to interviewing a realtor in Calgary, and it works just as well when you interview us.

How we measure up against our own criteria

Fair is fair. We sold roughly 75 homes in the past year at about $51 million in volume. We have been partners since 2016. We hold 150-plus five-star client reviews, and more than three quarters of our business is repeat and referral. We work from an office in Bridgeland and focus on Calgary’s inner city. We also publish our market calls each month in our newsletter, so you can check what we said against what happened, on the record.

If those numbers fit what you are looking for, we would be glad to be one of your interviews.

Frequently asked questions

Thinking about buying or selling this year? Start with a free, no-pressure home evaluation, or get in touch. Interview us alongside anyone else. We think the comparison works in our favour.

Two semi-detached infills in Killarney can be the same size, the same age and the same property type, and still sell $266,000 apart. Community and build year explain most of the price gap between inner-city infills. What is left over is the lot, the builder, and the finishing decisions you cannot see in the listing photos.

Buyers ask us constantly why one infill is $900,000 and a similar-looking one is $1.3 million. Here is the honest answer, using real numbers from our own market.

The quick version

• The range is wide: we looked at 171 inner-city infills built since 2005 across Altadore, Killarney, West Hillhurst, Mount Pleasant, Parkdale and South Calgary over the past 275 days. They ran from $716,000 to $1,530,000.
• Age does a lot of the work: homes built 2020 or later had a median of $1,235,000, against roughly $935,000 to $999,000 for those built between 2005 and 2019.
• Community does the rest: median price ran from $970,000 in Mount Pleasant to $1,295,000 in Altadore.
• Even matched homes are far apart: 14 Killarney semi-detached infills, all built since 2021 and all between 1,850 and 2,050 square feet, still ranged from $998,800 to $1,265,000.
• Lot width is the value nobody prices in: a subdivided 50 foot lot gives you 25 feet. A subdivided 55 foot lot gives you 27.5 or 30 feet. That changes every room in the house.

The rest of this post is what we check, roughly in the order we check it.

Why two similar infills sell hundreds of thousands apart

We pulled every infill built since 2005 that was active, pending or sold over the past 275 days in six inner-city communities. That is 171 homes, from $716,000 to $1,530,000, median $1,132,000.

Narrow to homes of nearly identical size and the range stays wide. Among 88 semi-detached infills between 1,866 and 2,039 square feet, prices ran from $744,000 to $1,349,000. Size is not what drives the difference.

Now hold everything constant at once. Fourteen semi-detached infills in Killarney, all built since 2021, all between 1,850 and 2,050 square feet, ranged from $998,800 to $1,265,000. The spread drops to about $266,000.

Most of the headline gap is community and build year. What remains is a quarter of a million dollars of lot, position, builder and finish. This is why we describe infills as death by a thousand cuts. No single line item explains the difference, a thousand small ones do.

Why we do not quote price per square foot

You will see this metric everywhere, and for infills it does more harm than good. It is only reliable when homes are built to the same spec, which is why it works inside a single condo or townhome building. Infills are the opposite: build quality and finish vary widely between builders, so dividing by square footage hides the differences behind a tidy number. Listing square footage is also above-grade only, so a basement with in-slab heat and nine foot ceilings adds nothing to the figure. The metric quietly punishes the homes with the best basements.

Community and age set your baseline

Before you compare two houses, know what the community is worth and how old the typical home in that sample is. From the same dataset:

• Mount Pleasant: $970,000 median, median build year 2022.
• Killarney and Glengarry: $1,075,000 median, median build year 2022.
• Parkdale: $1,150,000 median, median build year 2021.
• West Hillhurst: $1,250,000 median, median build year 2021.
• Altadore: $1,295,000 median, median build year 2016.

Look at Altadore. It has the oldest typical build in the group and still commands the highest median price, so that premium is location rather than newness. Worth remembering when you compare a new build in one community against an established street in another.

Start with the lot, not the house

This is where buyers lose the most value, because lot dimensions rarely make it into the conversation.

• Width: most infills sit on a subdivided 50 foot lot, which leaves 25 feet each. A subdivided 55 foot lot leaves 27.5 or 30 feet, and those extra feet change the interior width of every room.
• Depth: 120 feet is standard in the northwest and southwest. The better lots are 125, 130, sometimes 135 feet, which buys a larger home and a backyard that functions.
• Position in the community: the block, the neighbours, and what is likely to get built next door.

You can renovate a kitchen. You cannot widen a lot.

The details that create the price gap

We form a view from the curb first: landscaping, fencing, poured concrete, the general presentation. On a home still under construction we also read the job site, because a messy one can reflect the attention to detail inside. Not always, but it is worth noticing.

Inside, two infills the same size on the same street can be $200,000 apart on finish alone. This is what we are pricing:

• Kitchen and millwork: the quality and size of the cabinetry, the appliance package, the built-ins.
• Flooring and lighting: the grade of the flooring, and whether the fixtures were a budget line or a design decision.
• Basement specification: in-slab heating actually installed versus roughed in, ceiling height, whether there is a wet bar.
• Mechanical: central air conditioning, and tankless hot water versus a conventional tank.
• Primary suite: a full five piece ensuite and walk-in closets that are large in fact, not just in name.
• Garage and exterior: whether the garage is insulated and heated, and how complete the landscaping is.
• Window coverings: often left out. They can be expensive, though there are cheaper options, so price it before possession rather than after.
• Workmanship: corners, edging, grout lines, tile. Is everything square and lined up. This is the tell that separates a good builder from a great one.

Layout sits above all of it. Some builders are checking boxes and have clearly never thought about what it is like to live in the space. Others design as though they will move in themselves. You can feel the difference within a minute, and it shows up again at resale.

Are new inner-city builds actually cheaply made?

Partly, and we would rather say so plainly than defend the whole category. Build quality has come down as materials have become more expensive and as a wave of less experienced builders entered the market. That is not true of every builder. There are still excellent ones working in the inner city.

The sameness complaint is also fair. Many builders buy plans from architects that get recycled, so you see the same exterior repeatedly and floor plans that are variations on a theme. There is only so much you can do with the footprint, which is precisely why the finish and the layout carry so much of the value.

Do basement suites help or hurt resale?

One assumption worth correcting first: it is not true that almost every new inner-city duplex has a basement suite. Some builders in some communities are putting them in. Most are not.

Historically a suite would have hurt resale. That has changed. With infill prices where they are, a suite helps buyers who need something to supplement the mortgage, particularly in the less premium inner-city communities. In the most premium pockets it matters less. It comes down to the buyer in front of you.

The rules changed on August 4, 2026, and they are more detailed than one paragraph can carry: which lots can take a suite, the parking requirement, what “legal” means in a listing and how much of the rent a lender will count. All of it is on our secondary suites in Calgary page.

Semi-detached or detached, and who should not buy an infill

The buyer we most often steer away is the downsizer moving into the inner city on a price target. They are coming from a larger home, and the budget puts them in front of semi-detached infills where they will share a wall and have a much smaller yard. It is frequently not the right fit, because that buyer usually wants their own space and no party wall to think about.

The opposite happens too. Buyers set on detached often come around to semi-detached once they price the difference: in our dataset, a median of $1,249,900 for detached against $1,060,000 for semi-detached.

Two things worth knowing before you rule out semi-detached:

• The floor plans are often wider: with no setback on one side, semi-detached infills gain interior width, and the layouts are frequently more attractive as a result.
• Modern party walls are not 1990s party walls: current construction typically uses a concrete wall with an air pocket and double drywall. Noise transfer is usually a non-issue. There are exceptions, and we check.

For citywide context, the semi-detached benchmark price was $690,500 in August, up about one per cent year over year, with detached at $744,300 (CREB, as of August 2026). Inner-city infills sit well above both, but the relationship between the two property types holds.

What the August 4 zoning changes mean for infill buyers

Council repealed citywide blanket rezoning on April 8, and the changes took effect August 4. About 99% of properties returned to the zoning that applied before 2024. For future R-CG development, maximum height dropped from 11 metres to 10, lot coverage from 60% to 55%, and zero lot line developments are no longer allowed. Zero lot line means a building could sit right on the property boundary with no side setback, so removing it means new builds need a gap on both sides. That addresses the spacing complaint a lot of people had about recent construction.

One correction, because a few local sources have it wrong: rowhouses went back to being a permitted use in R-CG rather than being restricted to corner lots.

Our read for buyers is calmer than most of what is being written. We will still see corners rezoned to R-CG. What we will not see is every corner and some mid-blocks getting approved automatically, so construction will slow. That is likely beneficial for homeowners and property values in the inner-city areas where R-CG is still allowed. If you are buying a detached or semi-detached infill, very little changes for you.

What to check before an infill open house

One more decision worth naming: a brand new build carries a premium and the Alberta New Home Warranty, while a slightly older infill costs less and needs some TLC. We see it go both ways, and it is worth knowing what a purchase actually costs beyond the price before you decide. Either way, take this list with you:

• Check the lot size: width and depth, before anything else.
• Check the location: the block, the neighbours, what is likely to be built nearby.
• Find out who the builder is: then find out their reputation.
• Go see their other work: ask what else they have built in the area and walk past it.
• Look at all the fit and finish: corners, grout, edging, whether things line up.

Bright white paint and brass hardware do not make a luxury home. Plenty of infills read as high end in photographs and do not have the details underneath.

Thinking about an infill in the inner city?

We know these streets and these builders well, and we are happy to tell you when a home is not worth what it is asking. If you are weighing two properties, reach out through our website and we will walk through it with you. You can also browse inner-city Calgary homes or our southwest Calgary listings.

Frequently asked questions about Calgary infills

Here is what it actually cost to buy a $900,000 home in Calgary: a $45,000 deposit, a $675,000 mortgage, a bank draft for $183,885.39 at the lawyer’s office, and $1,897.25 in legal fees and disbursements. Those are real numbers from a real Calgary purchase, and this post walks through every line.

Most closing cost guides give you ranges. This one gives you an actual statement of adjustments. And full disclosure: the buyers were us. I bought this Wildwood bungalow myself, for $900,000 with 25 per cent down, so every number below comes straight from my own closing documents. Nothing has been changed.

The quick version

• Purchase price: $900,000 for a bungalow in Wildwood, bought with 25 per cent down ($225,000)
• Deposit: $45,000, paid on acceptance and credited against the down payment
• Bank draft at the lawyer: $183,885.39, covering the remaining $180,000 of the down payment plus every adjustment and fee
• Legal fees and disbursements: $1,897.25 all-in, including title transfer and mortgage registration
• Property taxes: prorated to the exact day. We credited the sellers $142.11 and paid the $1,646.03 balance of the year’s taxes
• Timeline: conditions satisfied, then a 90-day runway to possession, with the lawyer appointment a few days before closing

That is the whole picture in six bullets. The rest of this post is how each number came to be, and what we set up in advance so possession day was uneventful.

How the purchase ran, start to finish

• Offer accepted: we negotiated the price and terms with the sellers, then delivered a $45,000 deposit to the brokerage, held in trust. The deposit counts toward the down payment. It is not an extra cost
• Conditions period: the offer was conditional on a property inspection and financing. Both were satisfied and the conditions were waived, making the sale firm. The inspection fee, and an appraisal fee if your lender requires one, is paid at this stage, so it never appears on the lawyer’s statement
• The 90-day runway: possession was set for late August, about 90 days after the deal went firm. Longer possessions like this give everyone room to plan
• One month out: we set up utilities, home insurance, and property tax payments. More on each below
• A few days before closing: we met with the lawyer, signed the mortgage and transfer documents, and delivered the bank draft
• Possession day: the lawyers transferred funds, title changed hands, and we got the keys

What does the real estate lawyer actually do?

The lawyer is the hub of closing. They receive the mortgage instructions from the lender, search the title, prepare the statement of adjustments, register the transfer of land and the mortgage at Alberta Land Titles, and on closing day send the money where it needs to go. On this file, that meant $855,142.11 to the sellers’ lawyer.

One thing worth knowing: the lawyer sometimes does not receive mortgage instructions from the lender until a couple of days before closing. That means the final “here is exactly what to bring” email can land with only days to spare. A bank draft for $183,885.39 is not something most people can produce in an hour, so have the funds sitting in one account, ready to draft or wire, at least a week before possession day.

What is a statement of adjustments?

The statement of adjustments is the document that makes the purchase price fair to the day. The sellers had already paid $3,238.00 toward the year’s $4,884.03 property tax bill, but they only owned the home for part of the year. The lawyer prorated their share to the exact day of possession: $3,095.89, so we credited them the $142.11 difference. We then paid the remaining $1,646.03 of the year’s taxes through the lawyer.

Do not be surprised when small debits or credits like this show up. If the sellers prepaid their taxes, you owe them back the overpaid portion. If they were behind, the credit runs the other way. On a condominium purchase there is usually a condo fee adjustment too. Fees are paid monthly in advance, so the buyers typically credit the sellers for the prepaid balance of the month. We covered the condo-specific side of closing in our breakdown of condo closing costs in Calgary. One other line you may see on some files: an interest adjustment, if the mortgage funds a day early or late. None appeared here, which is typical when the timing runs clean.

What we were asked to bring

The law firm’s instructions before the signing appointment were specific. Four items:

• Two pieces of ID: one photo ID (driver’s licence or passport) plus a secondary piece, such as a bank credit card or birth certificate
• The bank draft: $183,885.39, payable to the law firm in trust
• A void cheque: for the account the mortgage payments would come from
• An insurance binder: proof the home was insured effective possession day, naming the lender as first loss payable. The lender will not fund the mortgage without it

The draft amount included a $200 contingency holdback for any incidentals not accounted for in the estimate. Unused funds come back to you after closing, and ours came back as promised.

Where the $183,885.39 came from

• Balance of the down payment: $180,000, which is the $225,000 down payment minus the $45,000 deposit already paid
• Property tax adjustment: $142.11 credited to the sellers
• Balance of the year’s property taxes: $1,646.03
• Contingency holdback: $200, refundable
• Legal fees and disbursements: $1,897.25

Those five lines add up to the bank draft exactly. The takeaway: on this purchase, everything beyond the down payment came to about $3,885. On a $900,000 resale home, that is well under half a per cent. The down payment is the mountain. The closing costs are a foothill, as long as you see them coming.

Three costs that were not on the statement

• Land transfer tax: Alberta does not have one. Buyers arriving from Ontario or BC often budget tens of thousands for this. Here, the land titles registration fees below are the whole story
• Realtor commissions: in a typical Alberta purchase, the seller pays both agents’ commissions. Nothing appeared on our side of the ledger, and nothing will appear on yours as a buyer in a standard deal
• Mortgage default insurance: with 25 per cent down, there was no CMHC premium. Below 20 per cent down, that premium gets added to the mortgage, and at this price point it would have added tens of thousands

Legal fees and disbursements, line by line

• Legal fee: $895 plus GST for the purchase and mortgage work
• Title transfer registration: $410 at Alberta Land Titles
• Mortgage registration: $252.50
• Everything else: about $283 in small disbursements, including the tax certificate, title searches, couriers, and file costs

Total: $1,897.25. One note for anyone budgeting from these numbers today: Alberta has since increased its land titles registration levy. The same two registrations now cost $950 and $725, about $1,000 more than this file paid. The current fee structure is on the Alberta Land Titles website. Also worth knowing: GST applies to the lawyer’s fee and disbursements, not to the price of a resale home.

What to set up before possession day

We handled all of this about a month before possession, mostly online.

• Utilities: transfers scheduled for possession day, done online in an afternoon
• Home insurance: the insurer asked for the MLS listing, the electrical panel details, the age and type of the roof, the plumbing type, the siding and window types, and whether the home had a backwater valve. Having the listing and inspection report handy makes this a 20-minute phone call instead of three
• Property taxes: we registered for the City of Calgary’s Tax Instalment Payment Plan (TIPP), which spreads the annual bill into monthly payments. The current year’s taxes were already settled through the lawyer, so TIPP simply takes over from there
• The pre-possession walkthrough: written into the contract. The sellers had agreed to a professional move-out clean and professional carpet cleaning, with receipts as proof, and the walkthrough confirmed the home was in substantially the same condition as when viewed. We write this into almost every contract, and we recommend you do too

What we tell friends about closing

Get everything to your mortgage broker or lender well in advance, and clear every outstanding financing item early. Even after you have waived your financing condition, the lender will not send instructions to the lawyer until its own file is complete, and late instructions are the single most common cause of a scramble in closing week.

Use a lawyer with deep real estate experience. Expect small tax debits or credits on the statement of adjustments rather than being surprised by them. And have your closing funds ready for a bank draft a week before possession, so the last few days are about picking up keys, not standing in line at a branch.

If you are working out your own numbers, our full guide to closing costs in Calgary covers every line item, and our mortgage calculator will give you the payment picture. And if you want us to walk a real budget for a real home you are considering, reach out. Walking through the numbers is our favourite part of the job.

Frequently asked questions about buying costs in Calgary