Closing Costs in BC: What You Pay on Top of the Down Payment in 2026

Buy the median-priced townhouse listed in Surrey today ($794,128 asking) with 10% down, and on top of the $79,413 down payment you'll need $14,085 for tax and registration fees before you've paid a lawyer, an inspector or a mover. The $22,156 mortgage insurance premium on that purchase never leaves your bank account. It gets added to the loan.

That split, cash versus financed, is what most closing cost lists blur. Below I price three hypothetical purchases at today's median asking prices on EstateBlock in three different cities, line by line: what the government charges to the dollar, what gets rolled into the mortgage, and what you have to get quotes for. These are asking prices of active listings, not sale prices, so read them as "what it would cost at the middle of today's list prices", not as what homes are selling for.

Source: EstateBlock.com live listings, snapshot Oct 13, 2026 (asking prices of active listings, not sale prices). Cash beyond the down payment for property transfer tax, two LTSA registrations and a strata Form B; legal, inspection, insurance and moving are extra. Hypothetical purchases.

Every line item, and who sets the price

The Financial Consumer Agency of Canada tells buyers to budget 1.5% to 4% of the purchase price for closing costs. That's a decent sanity check, but it's a national number, and the two biggest swings in B.C. are things the FCAC range can't know about you: whether you pay property transfer tax in full, and whether the home is new and carries GST.

So I split the list three ways. Some costs are set by law and you can work them out today. Some are prices from private providers, and you get them by asking for quotes. And one, the mortgage insurance premium, is usually not cash at all.

Source: Government of B.C., property transfer tax; CMHC premium table; CMHC, minimum down payment; LTSA fee listing as at April 1, 2026; Strata Property Regulation s. 4.4; BCFSA, Home Buyer Rescission Period; CRA, GST/HST rates.

Notice what's missing from the "set by law" side: the lawyer, the inspector, the appraiser, title insurance, home insurance and the movers. I'm not going to make up numbers for those. Prices vary by firm and by property, and a strata unit, an older house and a presale all need different amounts of work. Get two or three quotes for each once you have an accepted offer, or sooner if you're building a budget. My closing cost calculator lets you plug in the quotes you get next to the fixed costs.

Property transfer tax: the big cash item

For most resale buyers, PTT is the largest closing cost by a distance. It's 1% on the first $200,000, 2% up to $2 million and 3% above that, plus a further 2% on the residential part over $3 million. Between $200,000 and $2 million the shortcut is 2% of the price minus $2,000. Your lawyer or notary files the return and pays it when the transfer registers at the Land Title Office, normally on completion day, using money you've already handed over.

$450,000$7,000$638,000 Coquitlam condo$10,760$687,041 Burnaby condo$11,741$794,128 Surrey townhouse$13,883$1,000,000$18,000$1,500,000$28,000$2,000,000$38,000

Source: Government of B.C., property transfer tax rates; EstateBlock.com live listings, snapshot Oct 13, 2026 (asking prices of active listings, not sale prices)

Show the numbers

Price	PTT
$450,000	$7,000
$638,000 Coquitlam condo	$10,760
$687,041 Burnaby condo	$11,741
$794,128 Surrey townhouse	$13,883
$1,000,000	$18,000
$1,500,000	$28,000
$2,000,000	$38,000

Two exemptions can shrink it. A qualifying first-time buyer pays no PTT on the first $500,000 of a home worth up to $835,000, phased out by $860,000. A brand-new home worth $1.1 million or less can be fully exempt, phased out by $1.15 million, and you don't need to be a first-time buyer for that one. The full rules, the phase-out math and the occupancy conditions are in my B.C. property transfer tax guide, and the PTT calculator does the arithmetic for any price.

What matters for closing: plan on PTT being cash. It has to be sitting in your account when your lawyer asks for the completion funds.

Mortgage insurance: big, but financed

Put less than 20% down and you need mortgage loan insurance. The premium is a percentage of the loan, and it climbs as your down payment shrinks:

Source: CMHC, mortgage loan insurance costs. Standard premiums; 4.50% applies at 90.01% to 95% with a non-traditional down payment. Down payment column is 100% minus loan-to-value.

On the Surrey townhouse with 10% down, the loan is $714,715.20 and the premium at 3.10% is $22,156.17. That's bigger than the PTT on the same home. But CMHC says you can pay it in a lump sum or add it to your mortgage. Adding it is what I've assumed here: your mortgage becomes $736,871.37, and you pay the premium off, with interest, over the amortization.

So the premium is a real cost, just not a closing-day cash cost. Two more things worth knowing:

• PST. CMHC lists Quebec, Ontario and Saskatchewan as the provinces where provincial sales tax applies to the premium, and in those provinces the tax can't be added to the loan. B.C. isn't on CMHC's list.
• The $1.5 million line. Since December 15, 2024, insured mortgages are available on homes priced under $1.5 million (the cap used to be $1 million), and first-time buyers and buyers of new builds can get insured amortizations of up to 30 years. At $1.5 million and above you need 20% down. If you're stretching for a longer amortization, ask your lender what premium they'll charge on it.

The CMHC insurance calculator runs the premium for your price and down payment.

Three purchases, priced out

Here are three hypothetical buyers, each paying exactly today's median asking price in a different city. Again: asking prices of active listings, not sale prices, and real deals land above or below them.

• A. Surrey townhouse at $794,128. The buyer has owned before, so no first-time exemption, and puts 10% down. There are 949 Surrey townhouses listed right now.
• B. Burnaby condo, first-time buyer at $687,041, a resale unit, with the minimum down payment and the full first-time PTT exemption. Browse Burnaby condos.
• C. Coquitlam condo at $638,000, a repeat buyer with 20% down, so no mortgage insurance. See Coquitlam condos.

Source: EstateBlock.com live listings, snapshot Oct 13, 2026 (asking prices of active listings, not sale prices); PTT per Government of B.C. and first-time buyer exemption amounts; premiums per CMHC; LTSA fees; Strata Property Regulation; budget range per FCAC. Excludes property tax and strata fee adjustments, which depend on the completion date.

A few things jump out.

The townhouse buyer's known costs come to 1.77% of the price, already inside the FCAC range before a single quote. Add a lawyer, an inspection and a move, then see where you land in the FCAC's $11,912 to $31,765 range for that price. The premium of $22,156 is the biggest number in the column, and it's the one you don't write a cheque for.

The first-time buyer's known costs are only $3,943, or 0.57% of the price, because the exemption takes $8,000 off a $11,741 tax bill. My guess: for buyer B, the lawyer, inspection and moving quotes will be a bigger share of closing costs than the tax. The down payment is $43,704: 5% of the first $500,000 plus 10% of the $187,041 above it. That's the minimum, which puts the buyer in the top premium tier at 93.6% loan-to-value.

The Coquitlam buyer pays more PTT than the first-time buyer on a cheaper unit: $10,760 against $3,741. Twenty percent down means $127,600 in cash, but no premium at all, so the mortgage is just $510,400.

If you're working backwards from income rather than price, my post on the income needed to buy in Vancouver covers the qualifying side. Already own and coming up for renewal instead? See what a 2026 mortgage renewal does to your payment.

First-time buyers: what actually changes

For a resale purchase, the first-time buyer break on closing costs is the PTT exemption and nothing else. It's worth up to $8,000, and below $500,000 it wipes out the whole tax. Everything else on the list, from the lawyer to the LTSA fees, costs the same.

• Repeat buyer
• First-time buyer

$0$5,000$10,000$15,000$20,000

$450K$550K$650K$750K$835K$850K$860K

Source: Government of B.C., first time home buyers' exemption amounts; LTSA fees; Strata Property Regulation s. 4.4; amounts calculated

Show the numbers

	Repeat buyer	First-time buyer
$450K	$7,203	$203
$550K	$9,203	$1,203
$650K	$11,203	$3,203
$750K	$13,203	$5,203
$835K	$14,903	$6,903
$850K	$15,203	$12,003
$860K	$15,403	$15,403

At $450,000 a first-time buyer's known cash cost is $202.64, just the registrations and the Form B, against $7,202.64 for everyone else. From $500,000 to $835,000 the gap is a flat $8,000. Then it closes fast: at $850,000 the exemption is down to $3,200, and at $860,000 it's gone.

That's where today's asking prices matter. In Surrey, Langley, Maple Ridge, Abbotsford and Chilliwack the median condo is listed under $510,000 (Surrey $499,877, Langley $509,000, Abbotsford $399,000), so a first-time buyer there pays little or no PTT at the median. The median Langley townhouse is listed at $831,298, still under $835,000. Burnaby's median townhouse, at $909,667, is past $860,000 and gets no exemption.

The test is strict: Canadian citizen or permanent resident, a year living in B.C. (or two B.C. tax returns in the last six years), you've never owned a home you lived in, anywhere in the world, and you've never received a first-time buyer exemption or refund before. You have to move in within 92 days. My first-time home buyer guide walks through the rest of the process.

New builds and presales: GST changes the math

Resale homes don't carry GST. New ones do: 5% in B.C., since B.C. charges GST rather than HST. Two rebates can cut it. The standard GST new housing rebate is 36% of the GST up to $6,300, but it shrinks above $350,000 and is gone at $450,000, so on a new home priced at $450,000 or more it's worth nothing. The federal first-time home buyers' GST rebate is the one that matters: up to $50,000, covering all the GST on a new home up to $1 million, reduced between $1 million and $1.5 million. CRA's own example: a $1.25 million home gets $25,000.

To show how much the buyer matters, take buyer B's $687,041 price and make it a brand-new condo instead of a resale:

Source: Government of B.C., newly built home exemption; first-time buyers exemption; CRA, GST/HST rates; CRA RC4028, new housing rebate; CRA, first-time home buyers GST rebate. Assumes the new home qualifies for the newly built home exemption (principal residence, citizen or PR, never occupied).

The new-home PTT exemption covers both the repeat buyer and the first-time buyer here, because it doesn't care whether you've owned before. GST does care. A repeat buyer of the new condo pays $34,352 of GST, about $22,611 more than the same buyer's PTT on a resale unit at the same price. A first-time buyer who qualifies for the federal rebate pays neither tax.

The federal rebate has its own test, different from B.C.'s: you must be 18 or older, a citizen or permanent resident, and not have lived in a home owned by you or your spouse or common-law partner this year or in the previous four calendar years. Your agreement with the builder has to be dated March 20, 2025 or later, and the home must be your primary residence. CRA says applications are open. How the rebate reaches you (credited by the builder on closing or claimed from CRA) depends on the deal, so ask the builder and your lawyer before you count on it at completion.

Also read the presale contract for whether the price includes GST or is "plus GST". It's a 5% swing in your cash plan. More on that trade-off in presale vs resale and my presale buying guide.

When each cost is due

Closing costs don't all land on one day, and the timing is what catches people.

Offer accepted: the 3-day clock. On most resale homes you can back out within three business days after acceptance (weekends and holidays don't count) by giving written notice and paying the seller 0.25% of the price. On the Surrey townhouse that's $1,985.32. It can't be waived. Presales don't use this rule; they have their own 7-day rescission period under the Real Estate Development Marketing Act.

Subject period: inspection, appraisal, Form B. This is when you pay the inspector, any appraisal fee your lender passes on, and the strata for the Form B information certificate (capped at $35 plus copies). These come out of your pocket even if the deal dies.

Deposit. It's part of your down payment, not an extra cost, but it's due well before completion. Your contract sets the date; read it and have the money liquid.

Shortly before completion: your lawyer's statement. Your lawyer or notary sends a statement of adjustments with the exact balance owing: the rest of the down payment, PTT, their fees, LTSA fees and the adjustments. You transfer that amount to their trust account before completion day.

Completion: PTT and registration. The transfer and mortgage register at the Land Title Office, the PTT is paid, and the lender's money (premium included, if you have one) flows through. Possession is set in your contract, usually shortly after completion, and that's when the movers get paid.

One more item your lawyer will ask for: proof of home insurance, starting on completion day. Get quotes during the subject period, not the night before.

How much cash I'd have ready

My read: work out the fixed numbers to the dollar first (down payment, PTT after any exemption, GST if the home is new, $167.64 of LTSA fees, the Form B), then add your actual quotes for the lawyer, inspection, insurance and the move. Then add a cushion for adjustments and the things you'll buy the first week. I'd want that whole total in cash before removing subjects, not before completion. Once subjects are off, coming up short is a much bigger problem than a lost deposit.

The FCAC's 1.5% to 4% is a fair first guess, but in B.C. it can overshoot for a first-time buyer under $500,000, who pays no PTT, and undershoot for a repeat buyer of a new condo who owes 5% GST. If your price is close to $835,000 as a first-time buyer, or $1.1 million on a new build, know exactly where you sit before you write the offer. A few thousand dollars of price can move thousands in tax.

And don't count the mortgage insurance premium as cash you need, but don't forget it either. On buyer B's purchase, $25,733 gets added to a $643,337 loan, and the buyer pays interest on it for as long as it takes to pay off.

Tax rules come with conditions I can't see from here. Confirm your own situation with an accountant or lawyer before you count on an exemption or rebate.

FAQ

How much are closing costs in BC?

The Financial Consumer Agency of Canada suggests budgeting 1.5% to 4% of the price. In B.C. the swing comes from property transfer tax and GST. On three hypothetical purchases at today's median asking prices, PTT plus registration fees came to between $3,943 and $14,085, before legal, inspection and moving costs.

Can closing costs be added to the mortgage?

CMHC says the mortgage insurance premium can be paid as a lump sum or added to your mortgage. Plan to pay property transfer tax, GST on a new home, legal fees, registration fees and adjustments from your own cash.

Do first-time buyers pay closing costs in BC?

Yes, but less property transfer tax. A qualifying first-time buyer pays no PTT on the first $500,000 of a home worth up to $835,000, phased out by $860,000. Legal, registration, inspection and other costs are the same as for any buyer.

When are closing costs paid?

Inspection, appraisal and strata document fees come during the subject period. The deposit is due on the date in your contract. The rest, including PTT, legal and LTSA fees and adjustments, goes to your lawyer or notary shortly before completion and is paid out on completion day.

Sources

1. Government of B.C.: Property transfer tax (rates)
2. Government of B.C.: First time home buyers' exemption amounts
3. Government of B.C.: First time home buyers' exemption (eligibility)
4. Government of B.C.: Newly built home exemption
5. Government of B.C.: File and pay property transfer tax
6. Property Transfer Tax Act
7. CMHC: Mortgage loan insurance costs (premium table)
8. CMHC: What is mortgage loan insurance (minimum down payment, paying the premium)
9. CMHC: Mortgage loan insurance premium calculator (30-year amortization eligibility)
10. Finance Canada: Mortgage reforms effective December 15, 2024
11. FCAC: Down payment
12. FCAC: Buying a home (closing costs 1.5% to 4%)
13. CRA: GST/HST rates by province
14. CRA: RC4028, GST/HST new housing rebate
15. CRA: First-time home buyers' GST/HST rebate
16. CRA: First-time home buyers' GST/HST rebate, what you can get
17. CRA: First-time home buyers' GST/HST rebate, who can apply
18. LTSA: Fees (customer fee listing as at April 1, 2026)
19. Strata Property Regulation, s. 4.4 (Form B fee)
20. BCFSA: Home Buyer Rescission Period
21. Property Law Act, s. 42 (right of rescission)
22. Real Estate Development Marketing Act, s. 21 (presale rescission)
23. City of Coquitlam: 2026 property tax information
24. EstateBlock.com: Surrey townhouses for sale (snapshot Oct 13, 2026)
25. EstateBlock.com: Burnaby condos for sale (snapshot Oct 13, 2026)
26. EstateBlock.com: Coquitlam condos for sale (snapshot Oct 13, 2026)