Economic uncertainty — exacerbated by the trade war with the United States and a weakening labour market — represents the biggest challenge to Canadian real estate investors this year, according to a study from CBRE.
In fact, 63% of Canadian respondents to CBRE's 2026 North American Investor Intentions Survey ranked the combination of a hard-to-predict economy and softening labour market as their top investment challenge. The combined category also topped the list of concerns among respondents in the United States, with 61% placing it above all other challenges.
Overall, 74% percent of the commercial real estate investors surveyed "plan to buy more assets in 2026 than they did last year," the real estate services firm said.
Among Canadian investors who participated in the CBRE survey, 52% said trade policy is a major challenge, while only 11% in the United States cited it as a major challenge. Canada and the United States remain locked in a trade war over tariffs that seemingly is at a stalemate.
In Canada, 17% of respondents ranked the prospect of long-term interest rates remaining elevated and volatile as a major investment challenge. However, 47% of their United States counterparts cited the cost of borrowing funds as a big issue, according to the survey.
Last week, the Bank of Canada held its policy interest rate at 2.25% due to heightened economic security. Real estate professionals said they are helpful the central bank's decision will keep borrowing costs steady as the economy adjusts to slower growth and ongoing trade uncertainty.
Canadian investors also expressed consternation about U.S. inbound cross border investment with the amount of Canadian dollars flowing into the States declining to 24% last quarter from average of 35% between 2018 and 2024, according to CBRE.
Canadian investors are most bullish about Toronto, Vancouver, Calgary and Montreal domestically, followed by the greater New York City and Miami-South Florida regions right behind them. Dallas-Fort-Worth and greater San Francisco tied as the seventh most-popular North American markets for Canadian investors, the survey found.
Among asset-classes, the survey revealed that the appetite for industrial and logistics properties, at 59%, and retail real estate, at 56%, were strongest among Canadian investors.
Investors in both countries were not especially worried about the availability of credit in their respective countries, with 7% of Canadian respondents saying they were concerned that underwriting would become more conservative in 2026. Only 5% of U.S. investors echoed this sentiment, according to CBRE's survey.
These responses likely indicated high confidence in their access to capital for continued property investment in both countries.
CBRE said Canadians represented 26% of the 204 respondents to the survey.