Now that mortgage rates could finally be easing from their two-decade highs, you are considering posting a ‘for sale’ on your front lawn. Many Canadian real estate market experts believe that now is an opportune time for homeowners to list their single-family homes or row houses on the open market, with more buyers returning to the marketplace to achieve the Canadian dream. With 41 per cent of Canada’s housing sector expected to be in balanced territory and another fifth... [read more]

In March, our banking regulator, OSFI, announced that as of Q1 2025, it will cap the number of uninsured mortgages that each lender can issue where the loan amount is greater than 4.5 times the associated income. There was a lot of talk about what this means, and a lot of misunderstanding about how this may impact borrowers ability to qualify for a mortgage.  One of the biggest misconceptions I saw in social media and main stream media is that borrowers will not be able to get a... [read more]

In Ontario, a petition's shaking things up, calling for a rule that lets landlords boot tenants after 60 days of no rent. It's a bid to shake off the shackles of tight tenant laws that leave landlords hanging when the cash stops flowing. Currently if landlords follow all the correct steps, it can take a minimum of 8 months to over a year to evict tenant for non payment, causing financial distress, forcing landlords to sell and or leave their rental units vacant. On the flip side,... [read more]

In the aftermath of the coronavirus pandemic, many real estate sector observers wondered if the US and Canadian housing markets were in a bubble. When the Federal Reserve and the Bank of Canada (BoC) started raising interest rates, the widespread expectation was that both countries’ real estate markets would cool down. Well, four years after the COVID-19 public health crisis and about two years since the tightening cycle started, industry experts have been closely monitoring the... [read more]

The downpayment on a home can start as low as 5% of the purchase price.  Less than 20% downpayment must be insured which is an additional cost to the borrower.  Regardless of the downpayment amount, those funds are under the scrutiny of anti-money laundering laws. That could mean a lot of paper work for borrowers seeking a mortgage. Funds can be gifted or partially borrowed on credit, but that's a specific program that has its own process and requirements.  Most lenders do... [read more]