What Delays a Condo Renovation in Vancouver, and What to Do About Each Cause

Nine causes, who controls each, and what to do early

Each cause in the table is controlled by one person or body. That tells you whom to write to, and when.

The strata: the request, the meeting date and the conditions

An incomplete request. A council approves a described scope with named products. If the request leaves out a document your building's form lists, the council can ask for it, and its answer may then wait for a later meeting. Send one complete package: the scope, the drawings, the product sheets, the contractor's documents, the hazardous materials report and the planned dates.

A meeting after the planned start. Each council sets its own meeting dates. The Strata Property Act sets deadlines once you ask for a hearing. Under section 34.1, an owner may request a hearing at a council meeting by writing to the council and stating the reason. The council must hold a meeting to hear the owner within 4 weeks after the request. If the hearing seeks a decision, the council must give it in writing within one week after the hearing. From the request to the written decision, the longest wait the Act allows is 5 weeks.

Conditions after the contract. An approval can arrive with conditions. Standard Bylaw 5(2) lets the strata require, as a condition, that the owner agree in writing to take responsibility for any expenses relating to the alteration, and a building's own bylaws can add others. A condition that changes a product or a method changes the order and the dates with it. If a council asks for a change, we revise the scope, the price and the schedule together and send them back as one document.

Hazardous materials found by the inspection

Section 20.112 of the Occupational Health and Safety Regulation requires a qualified person to inspect for hazardous materials before renovation work begins. If the report finds asbestos or another hazardous material where the work will disturb it, subsections (7) and (8) stop that work until the material is safely contained or removed and a qualified person has confirmed this in writing. WorkSafeBC states that since January 1, 2024, asbestos abatement contractors, the companies that remove or contain asbestos, must be licensed to operate in BC.

Book the inspection during design. A report that exists before the schedule is written lets the removal be planned as its own stage, with its own dates. A report that arrives after the start date stops work that was already booked.

A suspect material found after demolition starts is handled under subsection (6): a qualified person samples it, identifies it and reports in writing.

The building: the elevator and the water

Materials, tools and waste travel by elevator. The Province of BC's page on common property lists elevators among the parts of a condominium that are typically common property, and section 125(1) of the Act lets the strata make rules governing the use of common property. Where a building requires bookings, a delivery that misses its booked time waits for the next free one. Ask for the booking rules in writing, and ask how far ahead a booking must be made.

Plumbing work that needs a valve serving more than one unit depends on the strata, because section 3 of the Act makes the strata corporation responsible for managing the common property. The strata sets the day and the notice to other owners. We ask for the shut-off dates as soon as the approval arrives, and we schedule the plumbing work on those dates.

Ordered items arriving late

The item with the longest wait sets the earliest date for the work that depends on it. In a kitchen that item is the cabinets, and our published wait for a cabinet order is 8 to 12 weeks.

The day the order is placed is your decision. An order placed before the strata's written approval saves time if the council approves the request unchanged. If the council requires a change to a made-to-measure item, you pay to change the order. We tell you which items can be ordered before the approval letter and which should wait for it.

A permit still to be issued

Inside the City of Vancouver, the City issues electrical and gas permits. Technical Safety BC, the body that runs BC's Safety Standards Act, lists the City among 10 municipalities that issue their own. It says a licensed contractor applies for the permit on the owner's behalf, and it advises owners: "Check to ensure there is one in place before work begins."

The City sets its own processing times. Its website refused our automated requests on October 4, 2026, so this page states no City time. Put the permit question to the City while the council is reading the request, so that the two waits happen at the same time.

Changes you make mid-job

A change after the work starts can affect three things at once: the strata's approval, an order already placed and the booked dates. Standard Bylaw 5(1) requires an owner to obtain written approval "before making an alteration", and the approval you hold covers the work the request described. A change that touches anything on the approval list goes back to the council before it is built.

Decide the layout, the flooring, the fixtures and the appliances before the request goes in. If you want a change later, we give you its price and its effect on the dates in writing before any work on it starts.

How we report a delay

We write the schedule as a list of dated stages, and we mark which dates depend on the council, the City, the building or a supplier. When one of those dates moves, we send a revised schedule that names the cause.