Calgary Cap Rates: The Method, Not a Number
You came here for a number. I am going to explain why the number you find elsewhere is unreliable, show you how to calculate yours properly, and then do it with you on a real property.
The honest answer is that a single citywide figure is close to meaningless, because cap rate varies enormously by property type, quadrant, building age, and whether the operating expenses in the calculation are real or assumed. A cap rate is net operating income divided by purchase price — and the number that decides it is the NOI, which means realistic rent minus every genuine cost: vacancy allowance, property tax, insurance, maintenance and reserves, management, and utilities where the landlord pays. Most published cap rates are inflated because they understate those costs. Build yours from CMHC’s zone-level rental survey and CREB’s published benchmark statistics, run it through a calculator that includes the costs people forget, and compare properties rather than chasing a citywide average.
Why this page has no number in it
Two reasons, and the first is the interesting one.
Sold prices in Alberta are licensed data. I have access to them as a registered REALTOR®, under terms that prohibit publishing them or any figure derived from them — averages, price-per-square-foot, yields, charts. A published "Calgary cap rate" built from sold data would breach that licence. So sites that publish one are either using list prices (which is not what anything sold for) or estimating.
And a citywide cap rate is not a useful object anyway. A 1970s walk-up in the northeast and a new infill duplex in the inner city do not share a yield in any meaningful sense. The average of the two describes neither.
The calculation, honestly
Cap rate = net operating income ÷ purchase price. The division is trivial; the NOI is where every optimistic number goes wrong. A real NOI subtracts all of:
- Vacancy allowance — not zero, even in a tight market. Turnovers happen.
- Property tax and insurance — insurance on rentals costs more than owner-occupied, and Alberta’s hail exposure has moved premiums.
- Maintenance and capital reserves — the roof, the furnace, the hot-water tank. A pro-forma without reserves is a pro-forma for year one only.
- Management — even self-managing, price it. Your time is a cost and one day you will want to stop.
- Utilities where the landlord pays, and condo fees where they apply.
General information, not investment, tax or lending advice. Whether any property suits your situation is a question for you and your licensed advisors. Figures you work out here are estimates, never promised returns.
The public sources that are legitimate
- CMHC’s rental market survey — zone-level average rents by bedroom count, published annually. The defensible basis for the revenue line. Note it surveys purpose-built rentals, so condo and single-family rentals typically achieve more.
- CREB’s published benchmark statistics — monthly, by community and property type. Public and legitimate for the price side, unlike sold data.
- The property’s own numbers — actual leases, actual tax notice, actual condo documents. Always beats a model.
Run all of it through the deal analyzer, which carries the CMHC data and estimates the costs most pro-formas omit.
Your cap rate, on a real property
Send me a listing — or an address, or the parameters you’re shopping — and I’ll work the honest numbers: realistic rent from the CMHC survey, real operating costs, and what the yield actually looks like once the costs nobody publishes are in it. I’ll also tell you when a deal doesn’t work, which is most of them.
Last updated 2026-08-26 · Written by Mohammad Emon, REALTOR® (SRES®) & Licensed Property Manager, KO Realty · RECA licence LIC-00666633