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Craig Blower
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Many Canadian homeowners pay too much for their homes because they are not getting the best mortgage financing available in the market.
The mortgage process can be intimidating for homeowners, and some financial institutions don't make the process any easier.
But I’m here to help!
I’m a VERICO Mortgage Advisor and I’m an independent, unbiased, expert, here to help you move into a home you love.
I have access to mortgage products from over forty lenders at my fingertips and I work with you to determine the best product that will fit your immediate financial needs and future goals.
VERICO mortgage specialists are Canada’s Trusted Experts who will be with you through the life of your mortgage.
I save you money by sourcing the best products at the best rates – not only on your first mortgage but through every subsequent renewal. So whether you're buying a home, renewing your mortgage, refinancing, renovating, investing, or consolidating your debts — I’m the VERICO Mortgage Advisor who can help you get the right financing, from the right lender, at the right rate.
BLOG / NEWS Updates
CMHC Privatization
As Jim Flaherty continues to make waves in the broker channel, limiting the use of portfolio insurance by mortgage lenders in the 2013 budget, the question of privatizing the CMHC has once again been raised as a means of levelling the lending playing field for mortgage insurance. “It served as admirably in the recent financial crisis,” Jane Londerville, associate professor and interim chair of the Department of Marketing and Consumer Studies at the University of Guelph, stated in a recent position paper. “But it has one important failing: it denies consumers benefits from full competition by giving the CMHC an unfair advantage over private firms.” Londerville, who also teaches real estate finance and appraisal, wrote a report in 2011 recommending privatizing the CMHC to level the playing field. Privatization might, in fact, loosen the government’s control over the mortgage industry, says some industry insiders. “I really see this as a double-edged sword, with the consumer taking the brunt of the blade in either case,” says Chris Karram, founding partner of Safebridge Financial. “If we leave things as is, that enables the government to make decisions that can drastically impact our real estate market as we’ve seen since last July.” The CMHC is currently very near or at the $600-billion cap set by Ottawa last year on mortgages it insures. CMHC, which controls about three quarters of the mortgage insurance market, is 100 per cent backed by the federal government. The two private insurers, Canada Guaranty and Genworth Financial, control the rest of the market and are 90 per cent backed by Ottawa. Their limit is $350-billion each. “Some may say it gives them more power than necessary for the specific service that CMHC provides and based on the original purpose of CMHC,” says Karram. “On the other hand, privatizing mortgage insurance will eventually put the decisions in the hands of a business, which has one goal, to make profit.” The new rules introduced by Flaherty will gradually limit the sale of insurance on a conventional mortgage - those with more than a 20 per cent down payment - which may cause lenders to, once again, tighten-up their mortgage approvals. Some of the recommendations for privatizing the CMHC include it being repositioned as an affiliated non-Crown public entity, equal to the terms set out for private insurers. Transforming the CMHC from a primary insurer to a re-insurer has also been suggested to help mitigate the risk to taxpayers. “In the end, it’s a tough decision either way,” Karram points out, “but at least if it was private then the Canadian government wouldn’t be able to dictate decisions that are made as they did in the case of the Manulife scenario.”
Prices continue to lose momentum in June
With the decrease in resale market transactions and the increase in interest rates, property price growth moderated for a third consecutive month, but still remained solid in June at 1.0% after adjusting for seasonal effects. Using the seasonally adjusted unsmoothed index, which is more sensitive to market fluctuations, the moderation is even more pronounced, with property prices essentially flat in May and June. While the Bank of Canada has indicated that it will continue to raise its policy rate and that transactions in the real estate market should continue to decline, we anticipate that the composite index should decrease by 10% by the end of 2023. The price declines have already begun to spread across the country. In fact, for all 32 markets where the seasonally adjusted unsmoothed index was available in June, 58% experienced a decline during the month, compared to 34% in May and only 16% in January. We have to go back to May 2020, at the very beginning of the pandemic when uncertainty was at its peak, to find such a large proportion of markets in decline.
https://www.nbc.ca/content/dam/bnc/en/rates-and-analysis/economic-analysis/economic-news-teranet.pdf
CANADA: Home sales continued to fall in June
From National Bank of Canda
On a seasonally adjusted basis, home sales fell 5.6% from May to June, bringing the level of sales 7.0% below its 10-year average. This was the fourth consecutive decline for this indicator, with sales down a cumulative 26.8% between February and June. The slowdown was broad- based, with the number of transactions declining in three quarters of the markets covered. We expect the current moderation in sales to continue going forward as the Bonk of Canada just announced a 1% rate increase this week and more rate hikes are expected by the end of the year. Now that interest rates for variable rate mortgages are generally over 4%, buyers must now qualify for the stress test with their mortgage rate +2% instead of a rate of 5.25%, which will add a drag on the market. The rapid rise in interest rates by the central bank is certainly having a psychological effect on buyers who are waiting to see how high rates will stabilize before taking action.
According to CREA, new listings rose 4.1% in June, a second consecutive monthly increase. With the reduction in sales and the increase in new properties for sale, the number of months of inventory rose from 2.7 to 3.1 months in June, the highest level in two years. Based on the active-listings-to-sales ratio, market conditions loosened in every province during the month, but the housing market continued to be tight in the country as a whole. Five provinces out of 10 are now in balanced territory: B.C., Saskatchewan, Alberta, Manitoba and Ontario (the two latter having switched this month). The others continued to indicate market conditions favourable to sellers mainly due to lack of supply.
On a year-over-year basis, home sales were down 23.9% compared to the strongest month of June in history last year. For the first semester of 2022, cumulative sales were down 18.9% compared to the same period in 2021.
Housing starts in Canada increased for a second month in a row by 21.5K in May to 287.3K (seasonally adjusted and annualized), the strongest print since November 2021 (at 305.9K). Starts were well above consensus calling for a 255K print in May while building permits remained high on a historical basis and housing supply continues to be tight. As interest rates rise and demand in the resale market declines, we expect housing starts to moderate in the coming year. Data on housing starts in June will be published on July 18.
The Teranet-National Bank Composite National House Price Index increased 1.6% in May compared to April and after seasonal adjustment. Ten of the 11 markets in the composite index were up during the month, with Edmonton being the exception. On a year-over-year basis, home price increased by 18.3% in May. The June Teranet -National Bank HPI will be published on July 20.
Source: https://www.nbc.ca/content/dam/bnc/en/rates-and-analysis/economic-analysis/economic-news-resale-market.pdf
