The BC government released their 2024 Budget which introduced a number of housing-related initiatives, including changes to property transfer tax exemptions and a new provincial property flipping tax. Transfer Tax Exemptions The threshold for property transfer tax exemption for first-time home buyers has been increased for residential properties from $500,000 to $835,000 as of April 1, 2024. The new rules… Read More »
Economic Forecast: Arguing the Case for a Rate Cut Coming this Summer
The Bank of Canada (BoC) will not offer any predictions about future rate cuts, for fear that investors and consumers will take any such talk as a green light to ramp up spending and work against the goal of reducing inflation. But that being said, here is our argument for why you might reasonably expect the BoC will start easing… Read More »
Economic Forecast: Upcoming Mortgage Renewals Will Slow the Economy
Last week, the CMHC published their fall 2023 edition of the Residential Mortgage Industry Reporthttps://www.cmhc-schl.gc.ca/blog/2023/rising-rates-homeowners-greatest-shocks-lie-ahead In it, the author Tania Bourassa-Ochoa draws from the CMHC’s national mortgage data to put specific figures to the coming wave of mortgage renewals in 2024 and 2025. In the first half of 2023 about 290,000 mortgages were renewed into the higher rates of today,… Read More »
Start Preparing Now for Your Next Mortgage Term: A cold winter is coming; don’t be a grasshopper, be an ant
If your mortgage term matures in the next 2 years, you should act now to find out what you should expect for your next term’s monthly payment amount. It is probably going to be much higher than you expect and you should begin preparing now. – The future is coming. Part of me feels ridiculous writing that, but when I… Read More »
Major Mortgage Regulatory Changes since 2006
Is the mortgage approval process different now than it was ‘back in the day’? Yes, definitely yes. Here is a list of some of the key regulatory changes that have occurred in the Canadian mortgage industry since 2006. 2006 Introduction of the first set of guidelines for federally regulated financial institutions, known as the “Guideline B-20,” by the Office of… Read More »
A Buyer’s Journey
The home-buying process is more complicated now than it ever has been, and unfortunatley that trend doesn’t look to be going away anytime soon. Every year, our industry regulators and the provincial and federal governments seem to add extra rules to mortgage qualification and the process of purchasing or selling property, and even experienced property buyers who have bought and… Read More »
New Anti-Flipping Rules from the Federal Government
New anti-house-flipping federal tax rules came into effect this year (Jan 1, 2023) aimed to reduce speculation and encourage long-term home ownership. These rules will now tax the profits from the sale of residential property as business income if the seller owned the property for fewer than 12 months. This means the sale of the property held for less than… Read More »
Fixed Rates on the Rise!
Fixed rates are moving up – if you’re thinking of buying in the spring, you should get pre-approved and lock in a rate hold now. January’s inflation numbers came out for the U.S. today, and while they did show a slight decrease from December on most measures, the decrease was less than many banks and investors were hoping to see.… Read More »
Remember to Claim Your First Time Homebuyers Tax Credit
Did you buy a home last year? As Canadians start to file their 2022 taxes, make sure that you or your friends and family are taking advantage of the First Time Homebuyer tax credit available for qualified ‘first’ home purchases in 2022. Even if you’ve owned a home before, you may be able to claim up to $10,000 for the purchase… Read More »
Inflation Continues to Cool: What does it mean for my mortgage?
The August inflation data have been released, and it has some good news for anyone with a variable rate mortgage or debt on a Line of Credit; for the second month in a row, the rate of inflation has decreased. August’s inflation rate fell to 7% on an annualized basis, down from 7.6% in July and from the peak of… Read More »
