A handful of apartment permits issued in the first half of the year account for most of the new homes permitted in Kelowna and Penticton in 2026. Since mid-summer, neither city's public records show a permit of 10 or more units, and new-home counts have fallen back to what houses, suites and small infill buildings produce.
Kelowna: 693 new homes, 61 per cent in seven permits
From January 1 to September 23, the latest date in the City's public data, Kelowna issued permits creating 693 new homes, counted from the unit numbers on each permit. Seven permits of 10 or more units account for 422 of them:
- 495 Dougall Rd N: 106 units in a six-storey apartment building, February 27. Permit record
- 647 Cook Rd: 103 units, six storeys, March 6. Permit record
- 1255 Pridham Ave: 69 units, six storeys, March 12. Permit record
- 215 Glenmore Rd (1951 Cross Rd): 68 units, six storeys, June 5. Permit record
- 2343, 2347 and 2351 Pandosy St: 40 units, six storeys, February 27.
- 3593 Lakeshore Rd: 20 units, four storeys, June 16.
- 2124 Pandosy St: 16 townhouse units, February 19.
The other 271 homes come from smaller permits: 120 in 88 new houses (including houses built with a suite), 59 suites added to existing homes, 57 in 19 duplexes, triplexes and fourplexes, 20 in four smaller apartment and townhouse buildings, six carriage houses and nine homes from other permit types.
The last permit of 10 or more units was issued on June 16. From June 17 to September 23, Kelowna permitted 117 new homes, all in smaller buildings: 29 in July, 38 in August and 20 in September to date. Kelowna permits by month.
Penticton: 634 units in seven permits
The City of Penticton's weekly building reports list seven permits of 10 or more units so far in 2026, totalling 634 units:
- 435 Green Ave W: 190 units, on a permit the City codes as institutional, April 1.
- 251 Comox St: 146 units, May 29.
- 170 Warren Ave W: 103 units, an addition to a multifamily building, June 22.
- 221 Yorkton Ave: 67 units, February 3.
- 443 Green Ave W: 57 units, May 22.
- 235 Yorkton Ave: 55 units, July 23.
- 795 Westminster Ave W: 16 units, listed in June.
The reports from July 27 to October 23 show no further permit of 10 or more units. The largest since then add six units at 795 Westminster Ave W and four at 655 Ellis St, both in September. Penticton permits by month.
Elsewhere in the valley
Other local governments publish permits without unit counts, so their figures are counts of permits or permit files, not homes.
- West Kelowna: 37 files for new residential buildings entered from January to October: 31 single houses, three semi-detached houses and three in the City's multi-unit category, which runs from duplexes to apartments. West Kelowna records.
- Rural Central Okanagan: RDCO approved 22 single-family house permits and two mobile or modular home permits in its rural areas from January to September, and none in October. Rural Central Okanagan records.
- North Okanagan: the regional district's reports from January to September list 32 new single-family houses, three houses with suites, four duplexes, seven manufactured or modular homes and one multi-family permit, for units five to eight at a site on Highway 97A. North Okanagan records.
- Lake Country: the District's public map shows 19 multi-family or mixed-use permits from January to May 8, but it has no records after June 5, so this year's count is incomplete.
About this data
A permit is approval to build, not proof that work has started or that homes will be completed on a set date. Unit counts are those printed on each permit. For houses and small infill buildings, OKTD shows the street name only; apartment and townhouse buildings are shown with the address the municipality publishes.
Sources
- City of Kelowna: approved building permits
- City of Kelowna building and occupancy permit open data
- City of Penticton: weekly building reports
- City of West Kelowna: permit locator
- Regional District of Central Okanagan: approved building permits
- Regional District of North Okanagan: monthly building permit reports
- District of Lake Country: building permits