A Vancouver-based developer believes the city may finally be entering a period in which building new hotels is becoming economically viable again — after decades of financial headwinds and government red tape.

Stanley Dee, founder of Deecorp Properties, points to long permit timelines, high construction costs, and elevated land prices as the primary barriers that have historically stalled hotel development in Vancouver.

While those challenges remain, Dee says conditions are gradually shifting. Construction costs have begun to ease, land values at many prime locations have adjusted sharply downward, and hotel performance has strengthened enough to justify new projects — provided they are carefully designed and well located.

“Hotels have been doing well, and costs are finally easing off a little bit,” Dee told Daily Hive Urbanized in an interview in late October 2025, adding that hotel construction is only now starting to “look interesting” again after decades of being generally financially unworkable.

Dee contrasted hotels with other forms of development, noting that while hotels face higher taxes, their revenue potential can better absorb today’s mix of costs if the right hotel product is delivered to the right market. Mixed-use residential and hotel developments, he added, can further improve project feasibility in some scenarios, as opposed to only pursuing 100 per cent standalone hotel projects.

Such mixed-use projects can leverage strata market ownership condominiums and/or secured purpose-built market rental housing to help subsidize the capital and ongoing operating costs of hotel uses, although these developments remain challenging in their own right. Certain rental housing components may also be eligible for low-cost, repayable financing programs supported by government.

For these reasons, Vancouver City Council recently introduced a range of new policies intended to help catalyze and improve the financial viability of new hotel projects, including the provision of extra density through added height, various other technical design relaxations, and mixed-use hotel projects with a residential component. Such policies apply to both the downtown Vancouver peninsula and other areas of the city, especially the Broadway Plan area.

Deecorp is currently in the preliminary stages of advancing three separate projects, each at different points in the development planning and review process. Each located at centrally situated, transit-oriented sites across Vancouver, the projects could collectively deliver nearly 1,000 hotel guest rooms, with some proposals also incorporating significant residential components.

Two of the proposals are located on Granville Street in downtown Vancouver.

As previously reported by Daily Hive Urbanized in Fall 2023, Deecorp is proposing to redevelop 1167-1193 Granville St. (previously addressed as 717 Davie St.) — at the northwest corner of the intersection of Granville Street and Davie Street — into a 33-storey, 100 per cent hotel tower with approximately 460 guest rooms. The project would also feature prominent restaurant uses to help activate and revitalize the Granville Entertainment District, as well as a rooftop bar, lounge, and pool atop the mid- to upper-tier hotel.

The site is served by multiple major bus routes along Granville Street and Davie Street and is located about a six-minute walk from Yaletown-Roundhouse Station.

The decision for the rezoning application for the Granville-Davie hotel project is scheduled to be considered by City Council at a public hearing on Jan. 15, 2026. This would be the first of the three projects to begin construction; if all goes as planned with rezoning and the forthcoming development application and building permits and other entitlements, the shovels could hit the ground in 2027.

The other downtown Vancouver proposal involves the redevelopment of 717 West Pender St., located at the northwest corner of Granville Street and West Pender Street. The site is currently occupied by a four-storey office and retail building anchored by a Rexall pharmacy — situated just across the street from the Starbucks Reserve.

The Granville-West Pender project is in the early stages of the rezoning application process. Dee told Daily Hive Urbanized the concept envisions a tower of approximately 33 storeys, combining a luxury hotel with residential uses within downtown Vancouver’s Central Business District. Roughly half of the building could be residential.

The site benefits from immediate proximity to both Waterfront Station and Granville Station, as well as numerous north-south and east-west bus routes.

Deecorp’s third project is located outside the downtown Vancouver peninsula, at the intersection of Yukon Street and West 8th Avenue. While this proposal’s design and planning process is a few years behind the pair of downtown Vancouver projects, Dee notes this is a larger lot and it could focus on long-term stay hotel accommodation. The project is envisioned to serve families visiting Vancouver for medical treatment — given its proximity to Vancouver General Hospital, BC Cancer Centre, and the future St. Paul’s Hospital — as well as business travellers. Dee described the long-term stay hotel segment as particularly underserved outside the downtown core.

The site is located about one block from Broadway-City Hall Station, which will become a major interchange between the Canada Line and Millennium Line when the Broadway extension to Arbutus opens in Fall 2027.

Looking ahead, Dee expressed confidence in long-term demand for hotel rooms in Vancouver, citing strong tourism fundamentals and a chronic undersupply of accommodations. He also pointed to post-pandemic travel trends, where semi-remote office workers increasingly combine work and extended stays, as well as tighter regulations around short-term rentals (such as Airbnb) that are pushing demand back toward traditional hotel accommodations.

According to Destination Vancouver, Metro Vancouver is experiencing a significant hotel room shortage. This is reflected in a years-long trend of escalating overnight rates, as demand continues to outpace supply.

To address this imbalance and ensure the region remains competitive in attracting a diverse range of visitors — as well as major conventions and events — Destination Vancouver estimates that approximately 20,000 additional hotel guest rooms will be needed in the coming years. This total includes 10,000 new hotel guest rooms within the city of Vancouver and another 10,000 elsewhere across the region.

Meeting this demand would represent an approximately 80 per cent increase over Metro Vancouver’s existing hotel room supply of about 25,000 guest rooms, roughly 13,000 of which are currently located within the city of Vancouver. Not only has the overall hotel room supply in Metro Vancouver — and in Vancouver proper — been stagnant over the past two decades, it has actually declined. Today, the region has fewer hotel guest rooms than it did when Vancouver hosted the 2010 Winter Olympics, largely due to redevelopments, renovations and conversions of older hotel properties into residential use, and pandemic-era government acquisitions of hotels for rapid supportive housing.

If all three projects are fully realized, Deecorp could fulfill almost 10 per cent of the 10,000 additional hotel guest rooms needed in the city.

But Dee cautioned that hotel development is “not for the faint of heart.” Success, he said, depends on securing lots of equity, selecting high-quality sites, choosing the right hotel operator brand, and executing every detail correctly in a market where mistakes can be costly and hotel margins are thin.

Despite the relatively higher risks, Dee remains optimistic. After years of analyzing the sector and working with operators, investors, and municipal government officials, he says Deecorp is focused on delivering projects it can stand behind. “We want to be proud of what we do,” he told Daily Hive Urbanized, underscoring a long-term commitment to getting Vancouver’s next generation of hotels right.

With softer demand for strata market ownership condominiums, office space, and increasingly even secured purpose-built market rental housing, standalone hotel projects — and mixed-use developments anchored by hotel uses — are beginning to make greater economic sense, particularly where recent policy changes have improved hotel project pro formas.

As a result, the number of hotel proposals has been steadily growing, with Deecorp emerging as one of the most active proponents of new hotel development in Vancouver.

Other notable proposals underscore this broader trend, especially near the Millennium Line Broadway extension’s future stations.

Concord Pacific is planning a mixed-use hotel and residential tower near the future South Granville Station. A Wyndham hotel tower project is also proposed near Granville Island, while three separate hotel developments — including a Hilton-branded property — are planned around the new Oak–VGH Station. Near the future Mount Pleasant Station, three hotel towers totalling roughly 700 guest rooms have been proposed, including a two-tower project with 500 rooms that would also incorporate a Filipino cultural centre.

Elsewhere, a mixed-use tower featuring a Marriott-branded hotel and residential uses is planned at the edge of Yaletown, along with a hotel tower proposed next to Stanley Park in the West End.

There are also mixed-use hotel tower uses proposed for the former Army & Navy redevelopment and next to Robson Square.

And Holborn Properties is proposing to redevelop the former Hudson’s Bay parkade city block into three mixed-use hotel, residential, and commercial towers, including a landmark 1,034-ft-tall 100 per cent hotel tower — Western Canada’s tallest building — with over 900 hotel guest rooms and a tower rooftop observation deck attraction.

In October 2025, Vancouver City Council approved the rezoning application to redevelop the parkade site of 516-534 West Pender St. and 509 Richards St., near Waterfront Station and Gastown, into a 29-storey tower with 100 per cent hotel uses. The project will deliver 586 hotel guest rooms along with a prominent restaurant destination. Just four weeks later, in late November 2025, a development permit application was submitted — signalling Marcon Developments’ eagerness to advance.

This past spring, construction began on a 30-storey, 100 per cent hotel tower on Seymour Street next to the Orpheum Theatre. The project will include 390 hotel guest rooms under Marriott’s Moxy and Element brands, offering accommodations for both traditional short-term stays and extended stays. It is currently the largest hotel development under construction in the city and is scheduled to be completed and open in 2028.