The debt problems in the US and Europe have taken the pressure off Canadians with mega-mortgages and credit lines that are over the line. Remember how Bank of Canada Governor Mark Carney and Finance Minister Jim Flaherty were warning not too long ago that high personal debt levels could become unmanageable when interest rates moved […]

While there are similarities, 2011 is not 2008. And it’s unlikely that we’re in for the same sort of market collapse we saw three years ago. First of all, the fuel of the 2008 meltdown was an overleveraged US economy, and the match that started the fire was the collapse of the investment bank Lehman […]

Just as British Prime Minister David Cameron used Canada as a model when assessing Britain’s troubled economy, Americans are noting that Canada faced many of the same problems in the 1990s and dealt with them successfully. Click here to read more in the National Post.  

Canada’s real estate market is now expected to grow this year rather than decline, as buyers take advantage of continued low interest rates that are intended to offset recent economic turmoil, economists said Tuesday.  The comments came after the Canadian Real Estate Association revised its 2011 national forecast for home resales, citing stronger than expected […]

Bank of Canada Governor Mark Carney is expected to confirm the obvious Friday when he speaks for the first time in almost a month: Canada’s economy is slowing down. A lot has happened since July 20th, the last time Carney spoke publicly. Then, on the heels of his latest economic forecast, he said Canada’s recovery […]

The Pitfalls of Adding Parents or Children to the Title of your Home in order to qualify for a mortgage Here is an article on of our private lenders forwarded over to me I thought I would share. Tune into The Mortgage Show Saturdays at 7pm on CKNW AM980 with 2009 AMP of the Year […]

The upside in a global stock market rout may ironically be a healthier housing market – at least in the short term, say economists. “The housing market has nine lives. Every time interest rates are supposed to go down, something happens and it helps to keep the market going,” said Benjamin Tal, senior economist at […]

What do falling rates mean for borrowers? This clearly falls into the 88% of the time where borrowers get significantly ahead by having a variable-rate mortgage. With the mess in the US expected to take several years to get sorted out, we’re in an unprecedented time where we can safely assume rates will remain low. […]

By David Olive Business Columnist How to put this politely? While not a deadbeat, the U.S. is no longer among the world’s most creditworthy nations. America now has a lower credit rating than Liechtenstein. And the Toronto-Dominion Bank. Mind you, that’s a matter of opinion. On Friday, U.S. credit rating agency Standard & Poor’s for […]

The US stepped back from the brink of default on Tuesday, but congressional approval of a last-ditch deficit-cutting plan failed to dispel fears of a credit downgrade and future tax and spending feuds.  President Barack Obama and lawmakers from across the political divide expressed relief over the hard-won compromise to raise the country’s borrowing authority […]