Everything’s a risk these days. You can’t even kiss your dog for risk of contracting somezoonotic disease. Even prime insured mortgages—where theodds of a borrower defaulting are less than your...

Variable-rate holderscan sit back in their easy-chair. Prime rate iscemented at 2.70% after the Bank of Canada pushed out itsforecasted economic recovery for the umpteenth time. The Bank said there’s...

The new posted-rate qualification rulekicked in today on high-ratio insured mortgages. Itcouldshut out more buyers from the housing market than any single mortgage change since the late ’70s, when rates...

The policy dudes at the Department of Finance (DoF) havedeferred the implementation date for theircontroversial new posted-rate “stress test.” The changeapplies to low-ratio insured mortgages and gives people more time...

“Since 2007, the share of all banking assets controlled by the largest six banks grew from 90% to 93%.”—John Jason, C.D. Howe ******* Fine time to land acrushingregulatory uppercuton bank...

The government dropped a bomb on the mortgage industrytoday, and disguised it as a firecracker. Policy-makers imposed a range of new measures with the stated goal of improvinghousing “stability.” Here’s...

The Spy’s tech team has been cooking up lots ofnew features to help you better analyze, track and compare mortgage rates. The latest additions were just launched and you can...

Effective January 1, 2017, financial regulators willmake default insurers (like CMHC) hold morecapitalwhen insuringmortgages in highly valued cities. The purposeis to keep government-backedinsurers more solventif home pricesfall off a cliff....

“Young folks with mortgages regularly thank me for keeping interest rates low.“ —Bank of Canada Governor, Stephen Poloz In fact, Mr. Poloz’s decisions to keep rates low have practically...

The mortgage industry’s most-watched number — Canada’s5-year government yield — is back above its midpoint for the year. As regular readers know, bond yields drive thefixed mortgage rate bus. The...