Brokerage Data Request Frequently Asked Questions

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BCFSA is requesting listing brokerages to provide information about sales of existing residential properties, including re-sale and newly built homes, from February 22-28, 2021 and February 21-27, 2022. To submit information on sales at your brokerage, please review the Brokerage Data Request Instructions, then download and complete the Brokerage Data Request Excel Workbook. Submit the completed workbook by Friday, March 11, 2022.

To support brokerages in completing the Brokerage Data Request, see below for answers to some common questions. Can’t find the information you need? Contact a BCFSA Practice Standards Advisor, at [email protected].

  • The government has directed BCFSA to work with industry to explore opportunities to collect additional data on real estate transactions. By collecting and analyzing data on residential sales over the past year, including how often buyers are making unconditional offers on homes, how often there are multiple offers on homes and how many offers are received on average, BCFSA will be able to provide government with evidence-based advice on consumer protection measures.

    For more information on our consultation about consumer protection measures, see Cooling Off Periods and Consumer Protection.

  • You will need to report data on sales of existing and newly-build residential real estate at your brokerage from these time periods:

    • February 22-28, 2021
    • February 21-27, 2022.

    Please report only on sales with firm contract dates in these time periods, and only on transactions where your brokerage was the listing brokerage (i.e., represented the seller). Do not enter information for transactions where your brokerage represented the buyer only. For the purpose of this request, residential real estate refers to existing and newly built dwellings including, for example, single-family homes, duplexes, townhouses, rowhouses, strata apartments (condos), manufactured homes, recreational properties, and other forms of detached, semi-detached, and attached dwellings used primarily for residential purposes.

    You may wish to consult the Canadian Real Estate Association’s Home Price Index Methodology, Appendix B for additional examples of residential real estate. 

  • You will need to report data on sales of existing and newly built residential real estate at your brokerage from these time periods:

    • February 22-28, 2021
    • February 21-27, 2022.

    Please do not report transactions outside of this scope, such as:

    • Transactions involving unrepresented sellers or where you otherwise represented the buyer;
    • Assignments of the contract of purchase and sale, regardless of whether you represented the assignor or the assignee;
    • Sales of pre-sale units;
    • Transactions involving commercial real estate (e.g., sales or multi-year leases involving primarily commercial properties.)
  • BCFSA has completed a privacy impact assessment and has established appropriate safeguards to protect the information and privacy of the parties to the transaction.

    Under the Real Estate Services Act, BCFSA has the legal authority to inspect brokerages’ books and records and to request this type of information as the regulator.

  • The information you provide will help us to develop evidence-informed policy advice about the consumer risks in a strong real estate market. It will allow us to provide greater factual information about the real estate market, including observations about real estate market practices and consumer risks in different time periods and different parts of the province.

    We expect to include aggregate data from this request in our report to government in Spring 2022 on the results of our consultation, and we will also share a summary of the data with industry.

  • No, you do not need to inform your clients about the request.

    BCFSA has the legal authority to inspect brokerages’ books and records and to request this type of information as the regulator.

  • For the purpose of this request, residential real estate refers to existing and newly built dwellings.

    For example, single-family homes, duplexes, townhouses, rowhouses, strata apartments (condos), manufactured homes, recreational properties, and other forms of detached, semi-detached, and attached dwellings used primarily for residential purposes.

    It may be useful to refer to the Canadian Real Estate Association’s Home Price Index Methodology, Appendix B for additional examples of the types of dwellings that are relevant to this request.

  • This is the date on which the contract of purchase and sale became firm. For a subject-free or unconditional offer, this would be the date that the seller accepted the buyer’s offer. For a conditional offer, this would be the date when the buyer (and/or seller) removed all subjects.

    Ensure the firm contract date is between either:

    February 22-28, 2021, or

    February 21-27, 2022.

  • While the Multiple Listing Service (MLS) system contains a lot of useful information and data about real estate transactions, it does not contain many of the pieces of information that we need to provide evidence-informed policy advice about the consumer risks in a strong real estate market.

    Specifically, BCFSA needs information about offers that is not recorded in MLS systems.

  • We expect brokerages to use their best efforts to respond to the request. We understand that this will require the review of past sales records, and so we have intentionally limited the scope of this request to help keep it manageable for brokerages, while still providing the data we need.

    Most of the information that we are requesting falls under the brokerage record-keeping requirements set out in the Real Estate Services Act and the Rules. So generally, we expect brokerages to have this information available.

    By responding fully to this request you can help demonstrate to government and the public that the real estate industry has an important role to play in consumer protection, by sharing information that tells the story of B.C.’s real estate market activity.

  • No, brokerages will not be disciplined if they do not respond to the request.

    This is not a compliance exercise. The information is being requested to provide an information base for our policy advice to government.

    We ask for and appreciate your best efforts to respond to the request.

  • Your brokerage head office should submit one workbook for the entire brokerage, including any branch offices. Work with the managing broker at the head office to report the applicable transactions as part of your brokerage’s single response.

  • No, you only need to submit the completed Excel workbook which includes the two spreadsheets: February 2021 and February 2022. Be sure to complete both spreadsheets.

  • If you have no residential real estate sales to report in either period (i.e., February 22-28, 2021 and February 21-27, 2022), send an e-mail to [email protected] indicating “nil response”.

  • Contact BCFSA’s Practice Standards Advisors:

    • Monday to Friday, 8:30 a.m. to 4:30 p.m. at (604) 660-3555 (local) or (866) 206-3030 (toll-free).
    • By email at [email protected].