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Cities / Calgary

Downtown · SW Calgary

Downtown West End

High-rise condos on the west side of downtown, close to the Bow River

  • Young professionals
  • Car-free living
  • Transit commuters
Map of Downtown West End and the neighbouring areas around it HillhurstLower Mount RoyalBankviewBeltlineDowntown Commercial CoreEau ClaireChinatownMissionHounsfield Heights–Briar HillRichmondUpper Mount RoyalCliff BungalowWest HillhurstScarboroSunaltaErltonRosedaleSunnysideCrescent HeightsDowntown West EndBeltlineSunnysideSunaltaHillhurstLower Mount RoyalEau ClaireScarboro1 km
Downtown West End in context. Neighbouring areas link to their guides. Boundaries: City of Calgary.

At a glance

A residential tower district on the west edge of downtown, almost entirely condos and apartments. Most homes are rented or owned by investors, and assessed values are for the homes themselves with parking and storage stalls excluded.

Median home value
$330K
2026 assessment, indexed to September 2026, all home types · city $566K
Residents
4,080
estimate for mid-2025, up from 2,825 at the 2021 census
Households renting
65%
city 34%
Permits per year
20
2021–2025 average

What the numbers mean

  • The median 2026 assessment is $335K (valued July 2025). Indexed to September 2026 with the Calgary MLS® Home Price Index (-2%), that is about $330K, 42% below the Calgary median of $566K. Property tax is still based on the assessment.
  • 65% of households rent, well above the 34% city-wide, so expect a younger, more mobile mix of neighbours.
  • Only 9% of residents are under 15, versus 18% city-wide.
  • 34% of residents are 20 to 34, versus 21% city-wide. It skews young-professional.
  • 100% of homes are apartments (23% city-wide), so a condo is the usual way in.
  • Building activity is lighter than the city as a whole, at about 20 permits a year.

Who lives here

Share of residents by age, 2021 census.

0-149%
15-191%
20-246%
25-3428%
35-4419%
45-5410%
55-6412%
65-749%
75+6%

Homes

Share of homes by type, 2019 civic census.

Single-family0%
Duplex0%
Townhouse0%
Apartment100%
Multi-plex & converted0%

Getting to work1

Drive, no traffic Bike

  • Downtown5 min drive · 13 min bike
  • Foothills and UCalgary8 min drive · 21 min bike
  • Airport20 min drive · 50 min bike
  • SE industrial15 min drive · 52 min bike

Transit times aren't included yet. Check Calgary Transit's trip planner for a weekday 8:00 a.m. trip.

Off-leash dog parks2

No off-leash area inside the community. 1 more area within 150 m of the boundary.

Assessed value by home type3

The overall median mixes house types, so it can match none of them. Split by type, 2026 assessments:

Detached house
—
too few in the Downtown West End roll to report
Semi-detached or row
—
too few in the Downtown West End roll to report
Condo or apartment
$333K
1,447 homes · city $295K

Estimated property tax4

What owning here costs each year in property tax at the median assessed value. Renters don’t pay it directly, but landlords pass it on.

Condo or apartment
$2,210 a year
about $185 a month on a $333K assessment

Upfront closing costs5

Alberta has no land transfer tax; the Land Titles transfer fee is about 0.1% of the price. Government fees at the median home price:

Land title transfer fee
$380
on $330K

Typical apartment rent nearby6

Downtown West End sits in CMHC's Downtown survey zone. October 2025 average rent of purpose-built rental apartments in that zone:

Studio
$1,504
+$66 vs metro average
1 bedroom
$1,613
+$32 vs metro average
2 bedroom
$2,046
+$138 vs metro average
3 bedroom or more
$2,755
+$637 vs metro average

Flood and airport noise7

None of Downtown West End lies inside the City's regulatory flood map.

Downtown West End is outside the airport's noise forecast contours (NEF 25 and above).

How it's changing

Building permits issued each year, a leading signal of new homes and renovations.

*2026 is year to date.

What the building permits are for8

Teardowns and infill
0.2 a year
Demolitions plus new semis, rowhouses and townhouses: construction noise, dumpsters and change on the street
Secondary suites
0 a year
New basement, garage and garden suites: more rental homes and more cars on the street
Home improvements
0 a year
Renovations, additions and decks: owners investing in homes they plan to keep

Safety9

Reported incidents in the last 12 months (October 2025 to September 2026), per 1,000 residents, compared with the median of 185 Calgary communities.

Reported crime
26.0
per 1,000 · above the 13.7 median
Disorder calls
98.3
per 1,000 · above the 32.6 median
Violent crime
9.6
per 1,000 · median 2.4
Property crime
16.4
per 1,000 · median 10.8
  • Reported crime runs about 1.9× the median Calgary community: 26.0 incidents per 1,000 residents a year, versus 13.7.
  • The most common reported crime is theft from vehicles, 31% of the total. 63% of incidents are property crime.
  • Crime has fallen since 2020: 86 reported incidents in 2025 versus 102 in 2020.
  • So far in 2026 (January to September) there have been 84 incidents, 31% more than the same months of 2025.
  • Busy main streets, transit and nightlife bring in visitors, and incidents are counted where they happen, not where people live.

What gets reported

Top crime types in the rate, same period.

Theft from vehicles31%
Assault25%
Break-in: business13%
Street robbery9%
Other violence8%

Disorder calls

Most common non-criminal calls to police.

Unwanted Guest31%
Disturbance26%
Suspicious Person20%
Drugs4%

Reported crime by year

*2026 is year to date.

Sources and notes

  1. Source: road-network routing from OpenStreetMap-based OSRM servers (car and bike profiles), pulled October 2026, from the centre of the community's boundary (City of Calgary) to each destination. Drive times assume free-flowing roads with no traffic, so weekday rush hour can take noticeably longer; bike times follow cycling-suitable roads and paths at an average speed and ignore hills and winter. Transit times are not included because we don't yet have a schedule-based calculation. Destinations: Downtown (Stephen Avenue); Foothills Medical Centre and University of Calgary; Calgary International Airport; Southeast industrial (Barlow Trail and 50 Ave SE). ↩
  2. Source: City of Calgary, Parks Off Leash Areas, matched to the community boundary by location, pulled October 2026. "Inside" means the area overlaps the community; "nearby" means within 150 m. Fencing comes from the City's fencing note: fully fenced, fenced in part (some sides or sections), or no fencing recorded. The City's shared park names sometimes cover several communities. ↩
  3. Source: Current Year Property Assessments. Assessments estimate market value on July 1, 2025, so they trail current sale prices, and they are not MLS benchmark prices (CREB benchmarks are not open data). Types are grouped from the City's property-use codes; see About. ↩
  4. Source: City of Calgary 2026 tax rates. 2026 residential rate 0.665% of assessed value (City 0.38906% + provincial education 0.27593%), applied to this community's median assessment for each home type. Homeowners pay tax on the assessed value, not the sale price. Excludes utility bills, local improvement charges, grants and credits, and anything above or below the median. ↩
  5. Source: Government of Alberta, Land Titles and Surveys fee schedule. 2026 rules, applied to this community's median assessment, indexed to September 2026 with the MLS® HPI. A mortgage adds its own registration fee on the loan amount on the same $50 + $5 per $5,000 scale. Legal fees, title insurance, inspection and adjustments are extra. ↩
  6. Source: CMHC Rental Market Survey, Housing Market Information Portal. These are zone averages across all units in apartment buildings of three or more units, not a figure for Downtown West End alone, and they are not asking rents. Houses, basement suites and condos rented out by owners are not included. Zones are large, so neighbouring communities can share one figure. ↩
  7. Sources: City of Calgary Open Data, Regulatory Flood Map (the version now in the Land Use Bylaw; a proposed update is still under review) and Noise Exposure Forecast Contours. Percentages are shares of the community's land area, not of homes, from a grid sample. They don't cover groundwater or sewer backup flooding. Hail and wildfire smoke affect the whole city; see the Calgary page. ↩
  8. Source: City of Calgary Building Permits, permits issued 2021–2025, averaged per year, pulled October 2026. Teardowns and infill: residential demolition permits (house or semi-detached) plus new semi-detached, rowhouse, townhouse and attached-unit permits. Secondary suites: below-grade suites, garage dwelling units and garden suites. Home improvements: residential alterations, additions, repairs, decks and basement development, excluding suites, garages and apartment work. Each unit of a semi-detached pair has its own permit. New detached houses and commercial permits are not in these three groups, and a permit is not proof that work was finished. ↩
  9. Source: Calgary Police Service, Community Safety Data (2020 to Q3 2026). Rates use estimated mid-2025 population. Incidents are counted where they occur. Counts of 1 to 5 are rounded by CPS. This community has grown fast since 2021, so its population is an estimate and its housing mix (2019) may be out of date. How we calculate this. ↩