Rate Emails Archive

6 Smart Strategies to Reduce Debt in 2013 Getting into debt can be easy, fun and faster than you think but unfortunately it can be very painful and challenging to get back out. It can take just a few months to create thousands of dollars of debt, but sometimes years to pay it off.  There [...]

I just wanted to follow up and give you an update regarding recent mortgage changes that take effect on July 9th, 2012. These changes currently only affect default insured mortgages which apply when you have less than 20% down payment or equity in your home. Below are the changes announced by the Finance Minister, I [...]

This spring the Office of the Superintendent of Financial Institutions (OSFI) announced several proposed changes to mortgage lending, such as cutting back the maximum line of credit mortgage to 65% (from 80% of the homes value), and now today the Finance Minister, Jim Flaherty made an announcement confirming what many of us expected, they will [...]

BREAKING NEWS – OSFI’s New Mortgage Rules… Office of the Superintendent of Financial Institutions Canada (OSFI) announces new rules for mortgages. We are not sure when they will take effect, but here is what we know so far… RE-QUALIFICATION AT RENEWAL TIME: Initially OSFI proposed that mortgage holders would need to be re-qualified at time [...]

Good morning, As you know, your variable rate mortgage, lines of credit and/or student loans are all based on the Prime Rate and as promised, here is your personal update from us on the recent Bank of Canada announcement on changes to their Overnight Rate which in most cases impacts your Prime Rate. At 9:00 [...]

Tomorrow the Bank of Canada will make its 4th rate announcement of the year. I thought you may find this interesting to see the changes since 1935… A History of the key interest rate Over the years, the Bank of Canada has adjusted the way it sets its key interest rate. Following is a brief [...]

Today news spread of yet another posted rate reduction by one of the “Big Six” Banks.  This is interesting given that many Canadian economists believed that these historic lows of under 3% on a 5 year fixed rate that we saw in both January and March of 2012 were well behind us. Could we be [...]

The BC First-Time New Home Buyers’ Bonus is a one-time bonus payment worth up to $10,000 for first-time new home buyers in BC. Applicants can receive a cheque of up to $10,000, if they qualify, and the amount of the bonus is not taxable. The legislation for the BC First-Time New Home Buyers’ Bonus is [...]

Most lenders raised their rates yesterday and many of the rate specials have come to an end. However, historically we are still in an extremely low interest rate climate. The lowest 5 year fixed is now 3.25% (Must have an accepted offer and be completing within 90 days) up from 2.98% yesterday. For pre-approvals and [...]

The cost of funding fixed-rate mortgages surged this week as bond yields escalated. The 5-year yield is up over 30 basis points in 10 days, and 45 bps since the end of January. That means lenders could start pulling some fixed-rate specials and/or increasing rates in general, as early as next week. Some have already [...]