As one of our steps to address the housing crisis in Canmore, we are limiting the growth of Tourist Homes in our community. Effective 2025, owners can no longer declare Personal Use for their Tourist Home property; all Tourist Homes will now be taxed at the same rate. In 2024, this rate was about three times that of residential properties in other subclasses.
What is a Tourist Home?
A Tourist Home is a specific type of property under Canmore’s Land Use Bylaw (LUB) for which an official Development Permit has been issued. They can be rented out on a short-term or long-term basis or used for personal use.
For property tax purposes, a Tourist Home is a sub-class of residential property and is assigned the class 21 assessment code (Tourist Home).
| Tourist Home | Residential |
| Can rent it out short term. | Cannot rent it out short term. |
| Cannot declare it as a primary residence. | May qualify to declare as a primary residence. |
| Can stay there full time. | Can stay there full time. |
| Can stay there part time. | Can stay there part time. |
| Can rent it out long term. | Can rent it out long term. |
If you want to skip an explanation of the changes and jump right to any actions you may have to take, click here.
Here is What's Staying the Same
- Owners of Tourist Home properties can continue to rent the property out on a short-term or long-term basis, or to use the property for their own personal use.
- Tourist Homes will continue to be taxed at a rate that is higher than the Residential rate.
- Tourist Home owners are required to maintain a valid business license for short-term rentals.
Here is What's Changing
Effective 2025, owners can no longer declare Personal Use for their Tourist Home property. This means that all Tourist Homes are taxed at the same rate, even if they are lived in by an owner. The Tourist Home tax rate is about three times the rate of residential properties.
A new, streamlined Change of Use/Conversion process is available to allow owners of Tourist Homes to convert their property to Residential use. The fees for conversion from Tourist Home to Residential will be waived until December 31, 2026.
Additional Changes Coming Your Way
We are in the process of making changes to the Land Use Bylaw (LUB) to eliminate Tourist Homes as a permitted use for a property. Once these changes have been made to the LUB, existing Tourist Homes will remain as Tourist Homes, but –while there may be exceptions—the option to revert or convert a Residential Property to a Tourist Home, or the option to build new Tourist Homes, will be eliminated.
We are writing changes into the Business Registry Licensing Bylaw that direct every short-term rental unit to acquire and display a valid Town of Canmore business license, including in advertisements and in the property. Every unique property will require a separate business license. For example, a property owner with three individual units requires three individual licenses. Properties not displaying a valid license number would be subject to enforcement action, which can include fines.
Here is What You Need to Do
To help you understand how eliminating the Personal Use declaration impacts you, or how the changes to the Land Use Bylaw and/or Business Registry may impact you, we have outlined actions and next steps in the table below.
| I Want To... | Your Next Step(s) | Here's How | Tax Rate |
| Rent my property out on a short-term basis |
Acquire a business licence |
Visit the Business Licence webpage | Tourist Home |
| Live in my property or rent it out long-term, but not on a short-term basis | Consider converting the property from Tourist Home to Residential to qualify for the Residential tax rate | Apply for a Change of Use: Tourist Home to Residential | Residential* |
| Have the flexibility to live in my property or rent it out long-term but may want to rent it short-term in the future | A valid business licence is required if you choose to rent the property on a short-term basis |
Visit the Business Licence webpage |
Tourist Home |
*As part of our Housing Action Plan, owners will have the option to declare a property as their primary residence. Primary residences will be taxed at a different Residential rate. Details on the primary residence tax rate are forthcoming.
Other Things to Consider
If your property was designated as Tourist Home – Personal Use (Assessment Code 21A) in 2024 and you will not be converting to Residential in 2025, you can expect to see a significant increase in your taxes in June 2025. We encourage you to factor this change into your financial planning now.
If your property is registered on the monthly Tax Installment Payment Plan (TIPP), your payments will drastically increase for July – December of 2025 based on your TIPP amounts being rebalanced to the new tax rate. You can proactively have your monthly payments adjusted to smooth out this increase. Contact taxes@canmore.ca to request this adjustment prior to December 31, 2024.