When you put down 7% on a $650,000 house in Oakville, your lender will add roughly $24,000 to your mortgage balance before you sign anything. That's the premium for mortgage default insurance, a policy you're required to buy, that you'll pay interest
A Victoria-based software consultant closed 2024 at $287,000 in net income. His accountant filed a T1, charged $1,800, and said nothing about the $114,000 he'd just handed to the CRA that could have stayed in his control. That silence will cost him seven figures
A broker just told his client not to refinance. He walked through the numbers, prepayment penalty, new appraisal fees, legal costs, and concluded the client would be better off sitting tight for another twenty-four months. No transaction. No commission. The client thanked him and hung up. Most advisors never
The S&P/TSX Composite added 148 points on Friday morning while crude oil prices dipped below $78, a combination that seems contradictory until you look at what's actually driving the move. Energy stocks account for roughly 15% of the index, but the other 85% often benefits
A homebuyer in Vancouver saves for seven years and puts down 22% on a $900,000 condo. Their friend buys six months later with 7% down on a similar unit. The friend's mortgage rate is 4.49%. The first buyer's rate is 4.74%. The borrower
The government backstop just saved someone putting down 8% about forty basis points versus the person who scraped together 25%. That's roughly $8,000 over five years on a $600,000 property in Greater Victoria. Nobody tells you this when you're draining your TFSA trying to
The 15% Down Payment Gets a Better Rate Than 25% Because the Bank Isn't Taking Your Risk A buyer in Kelowna put down 15% on a $640,000 townhouse in November and locked in at 4.74%. Her sister, who saved longer and put down 30% on a
The homebuyer with $120,000 saved for a down payment on a $600,000 condo in Vancouver walked into a rate of 5.29%. The couple next door, scraping together $30,000, locked 4.89%. Same building, same lender, same week in October 2024. The higher your down payment in
A financial planner recently received a call from a 32-year-old software engineer earning $280,000 annually who wanted to buy a Porsche 911 Turbo. The car was $185,000. The client had the cash. He asked if it made sense. The planner did not moralize. He quantified. $185,
A $1.2 million house in Saskatoon. That sentence would have been punchline material three years ago. Now it's data. RE/MAX's early-2026 numbers show luxury home sales climbing in Edmonton, Saskatoon, Ottawa, and Calgary while Toronto and Vancouver cool. The definitional threshold for "
Three senior appointments landed at EQB Bank in the last four weeks, all from the same place: PC Financial. The hire-before-close pattern is unusual but not accidental. EQB announced the $340 million acquisition of PC Financial in February 2026, with a regulatory approval timeline stretching into late Q2.
Statistics Canada's May retail sales report landed at 1%, and the entire gain sat in one category. Gasoline stations accounted for the full percentage point. Strip out fuel, and core retail was flat month-over-month. That split matters more than the headline suggests. When one category carries