Selling your business in Victoria
Greater Victoria counts about 15,000 business locations with staff, and many of their owners are nearing retirement: at the last census, 4 in 10 self employed people here were 55 or older. Selling well starts with knowing what your municipality, the province and your buyer will ask of you.
How we help a Victoria owner sell
We help owners navigate the sale of their business. The preparation is ours to do; every decision stays yours.
Your price range, before anything else
A free sale plan gives you a price range for the business and the steps we would take to bring it to buyers. It costs nothing and commits you to nothing.
A buyer package built from your statements
We turn your own financial statements into a confidential package that shows a buyer how the business makes its money.
A head start for registered buyers
Our Buyers Market Club gets a seven day head start on every new business, before it may be listed publicly.
Your name held back
Buyers sign our confidentiality agreement before they learn who you are or see a single number.
Your terms, your timing
You pick the buyer, accept or turn down every offer, and set the closing date.
Nothing to pay upfront
You pay our success fee on the day the sale closes, from the proceeds.
What BC asks of a Victoria seller
These are provincial rules, so they hold in every municipality on this page.
WorkSafeBC
If premiums are owed, the business's assets can carry a lien in WorkSafeBC's favour, so it tells anyone buying assets to contact it first. A clearance for an asset sale is asked for by phone or fax rather than online, so start early.
WorkSafeBC: clearance letters
PST and GST
Goodwill carries no PST; equipment and other taxable goods do, and stock bought for resale can pass free of it. Your buyer should hold a PST clearance certificate before buying, and a qualifying sale can skip GST through a joint election on Form GST44.
BC's PST notice on business sales; CRA Form GST44
Your staff
Under BC law your employees' service runs on, unbroken, through the sale: the new owner inherits their years with you and your duties to them under the Employment Standards Act.
Employment Standards Act, section 97
Your lease or building
When the deal includes a lease or a building, that piece is real estate, and a licensed commercial realtor takes care of it. BC's land title office, the LTSA, charges $83.82 to register a transfer of title.
BCFSA; LTSA fees, 1 April 2026
Liquor licences
A change of owner means transferring the liquor licence, which only works while it is current. You start it in the provincial portal, the buyer's application costs $330, and the licence stays your responsibility until the branch calls the application administratively complete.
Liquor and Cannabis Regulation Branch
Island Health permits
A permit to run a food service establishment is not transferable under BC's Food Premises Regulation, so your buyer gets their own, and the City of Victoria asks for a health inspection certificate with some licence applications.
Food Premises Regulation, section 8; City of Victoria
Thirteen municipalities, one market
Business locations with employees in each municipality, from Statistics Canada's count for June 2026.
The core
- Victoria5,125
- Saanich3,906
- Oak Bay753
- Esquimalt366
The Victoria metropolitan area as a whole: 15,193.
The West Shore and Sooke
- Langford1,519
- Colwood492
- Sooke419
- View Royal281
- Metchosin202
- Highlands98
The Saanich Peninsula
- Central Saanich765
- Sidney593
- North Saanich459
What your buyer files with the municipality
In Victoria, Saanich and Langford, a licence does not pass to a buyer. Plan the closing date around the step yours asks for.
Victoria
City of Victoria licences are not transferable, and fees paid are not refunded. Your buyer files the City's general application with its Change of Owner box ticked, and a complete application takes about 10 working days. You close your account with the City's closure form, marked sold business; a company needs two directors to sign it.
Saanich
Saanich licences cannot be transferred, so your buyer applies for their own. A commercial space under 5,000 square feet is licensed for $100 a year, a larger one for $200, and every licence runs from January 1 to December 31.
Langford
A licence for a business based in Langford never expires and needs no renewal, until the business closes, moves or changes ownership. A new owner needs a new licence before carrying on, and the City's planning, bylaw, building and fire review usually takes two to four weeks.
Zoning and legal use
Before the licence, a buyer looks at the space itself. Zoning decides what may run there, and its legal use under the BC Building Code can mean a building permit for a change of use or alterations.
Trades across the region
A contractor, caterer or other mobile trade can hold one mobile business licence that works in all 13 municipalities, bought from the municipality where its office is. Your buyer gets theirs from their own home municipality.
Trades up the Island
A trade that also works north of the region can add a licence for the Island towns that take part, offered on the City's own application form.
What is a Victoria business worth?
Buyers value a small business by what it earns in a year, times a multiple that depends on its industry. Our free estimate starts from the average multiple for your industry in published sales (North American sales data) and shows you a range, not a single number. Each industry's range sits on our free business valuation page, and our guide to how many times profit a business is worth walks through the math.
Victoria owners we help
We sell all types of businesses, in every industry. Across the 13 municipalities the largest groups with staff are health care, professional services, construction and the trades, shops, personal services and repair shops, and restaurants. Health care alone counts 2,234, among them 962 doctors' offices and 232 dental offices. The province's steps are set out in our guide on how to sell a business in BC.
- Health care
- Professional services
- Construction and the trades
- Shops
- Personal services and repair
- Restaurants
Questions Victoria owners ask
Does my City of Victoria licence go to the buyer?
My crew works all over Greater Victoria. Can a buyer keep that up?
Who sees my business first?
What does selling with you cost?
Do you work outside Greater Victoria?
Ask for your free sale plan: a price range for your Victoria business, and the way we would take it to buyers.
Rather talk first? Phone 778-760-8081 and speak with a Senior Deal Advisor.
Sources
- Business locations with employees by municipality, June 2026: Statistics Canada, table 33-10-1176-01, census subdivisions (Victoria 5,125; Saanich 3,906; Langford 1,519; Central Saanich 765; Oak Bay 753; Sidney 593; Colwood 492; North Saanich 459; Sooke 419; Esquimalt 366; View Royal 281; Metchosin 202; Highlands 98; together 14,978, of which 14,274 have 1 to 49 employees), the Victoria census metropolitan area (15,193), and for the 13 municipalities together, health care and social assistance (2,234), offices of physicians (962) and offices of dentists (232).
- Self employed people by age, Victoria census metropolitan area, 2021 Census: Statistics Canada, table 98-10-0593-01 (35,965 self employed, 14,570 of them aged 55 or older: 40.5%).
- Plans to sell or transfer within ten years, British Columbia, third quarter 2026, businesses more than 20 years old: Statistics Canada, Canadian Survey on Business Conditions, table 33-10-1196-01 (23.7%).
- Licence rules: City of Victoria, "Business Licensing", its general business licence application and its account closure form; District of Saanich, "Changes to Your Business Licence" and "Fees"; City of Langford, "Business Licensing" and Business Licence and Business Regulation Bylaw 216, section 21.
- The region's shared trades licence: the Province's page on mobile business licences, updated 21 September 2026, which names the Greater Victoria partnership of 13 communities.
- The province's rules for a sale: WorkSafeBC's page on clearance letters; BC's PST notice for buyers and sellers of a business, updated 31 July 2026, and the CRA's Form GST44; section 97 of the Employment Standards Act and the Branch's reading of it; BCFSA's guideline on business sales and the LTSA's fees as of 1 April 2026; the branch's liquor licence transfer steps; and section 8 of the food premises rules, B.C. Reg. 210/99, current to 27 October 2026.
Succession Market publishes this page from Kelowna, British Columbia. It is general information, not tax or legal advice for a particular sale. Updated .