Big news here for people wanting to switch lenders with a mortgage that was previously refinanced. Until recently, it hasn’t been possible to move your mortgage to a new lender and get ultra-low default insured rates if you had previously refinanced that mortgage.That was due to an interpretation of the insurance rules implemented by the Department of Finance in 2016....
It used to be a lot easier to understand mortgages. But since January 2016 alone, we’ve seen: Minimum down payments increased to 10% for any portion of a mortgage above $500,000 Restrictions on refinancing Rates become much more dependent on: loan-to-value (because of changes to default insurance) amortization credit scores A stress test required for all insured mortgages, using the...
If you like low mortgage rates, there was good news from Canada’s housing agency Wednesday. CMHC CEO Evan Siddall said a proposal to have lenders potentially share losses when insured borrowers default is now on the back burner. This Department of Finance scheme was sold as a way to encourage more prudence in lender underwriting. But it also threatened to...
We don’t buy the numbers in this story. Its premise is that some people are better off paying for mortgage default insurance—even if they don’t technically need it—just to get a better rate. The reason: insured rates are lower than uninsured rates (45 bps lower, claims the broker in the story). Really? Let’s test this theory and see if mortgage...
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