August 22, 2025: Turning Offices into Homes, a Residential Conversion Success

As Canadian cities grapple with a dual crisis, housing crisis and a glut of vacant office space, adaptive reuse has emerged as a hopeful solution.  Office vacancy rates remain double digit high, nationally at 16.6% in the 2nd quarter of 2025.

But not every office building is ripe for conversion; the goldilocks tower is usually a Class-B or -C office with traditional layout and windows (Canadian Consulting Engineer, 2025).
It's not always cheaper but it's faster.  Conversions may not reduce costs significantly, but they can speed up delivery when housing is urgently needed. That’s where Calgary is leading the charge.  Calgary’s Downtown Strategy offers a $75/sqft grant to jump start downtown revitalization.  

As of June 10, 2025, downtown Calgary’s success includes:

• 10 office transformations
• 1,100 new homes created
• Office vacancy dropped from 22.5% to 20% (Q2 2024 to Q2 2025)
• 1.1 million sqft moved into housing

There’s a dozen more projects in the pipeline, breathing life and vibrancy into the community and the program’s results are showing.  The Washington Post declared that Calgary’s approach offers a road map for other beleaguered cities struggling with empty downtowns!  Let’s hear it for Calgary and their bold Downtown Strategy!

➡️Downtown Strategy incentive programs - this page includes a 3D revitalization Map of completed projects

➡️ Read more in the Canadian Consulting Engineer article: The Conversation: Converting offices to shelters and housing, February 21, 2025