By MoneySense staff In recent years, homeowners have been feeling pretty smug about their investing prowess as they’ve watched home prices surge. But the costs homeowners face to buy, sell and maintain their homes mean they haven’t made nearly as much as they think. In this example, we calculated your real profit — after expenses — […]

By Romana King | From MoneySense Magazine Borrow to buy real estateIt was the mid-1980s and D.G. Southen was only 24 years old when he bought his first investment — a house near the University of Western Ontario in London, Ont. He borrowed $20,000 from his parents to put a down payment on an $80,000 house. To pay […]

By MoneySense staff Use mortgage brokers and insurance brokers to help you shop for the best deal in their respective areas. Unlike salespeople who represent just a single bank or insurance company, brokers can show you products from several firms and steer you to the best deal. An insurance broker can compare features of policies from […]

Financial Post Staff OTTAWA — Home prices rose during the third quarter of 2011, but the raw numbers may not be telling the whole story of the Canadian housing market, a new survey says. The Royal LePage House Price Survey released Wednesday found that the average price of a home in Canada increased between 5.7% […]

By Helen Morris When we reach retirement the goal for many of us is to have paid off our mortgage, leaving us with full equity in our homes. If you are thinking about extracting some of that equity to give yourself extra income in retirement, financial planners urge you to consider the pros and cons […]

Derek Abma OTTAWA — Canada’s housing market “remains a notable out-performer” in comparison to other countries, where renewed doubts about the strength of the global economy are weakening an already fragile real-estate scene, says a report released Tuesday. The Bank of Nova Scotia said in an assessment of the global housing market that high unemployment, […]

By Annette McLeod The best advice you’ll ever get about being late with your mortgage payment is not to be, but life is seldom so simple. The next best thing is taking an active approach to the problem if financial trouble hits. The very first thing you should do is call the people who loaned […]

Terence Corcoran Bankers’ battle highlights regulatory risks to global economy The Mark Carney vs. Jamie Dimon matchup looks like fun. Too bad nobody got to see the fisticuffs. The headlines are certainly hot: The JPMorgan Chase CEO is said to have delivered a “tirade” and “attack” that “roasted,” “ripped” and “lashed” the governor of the […]

KEVIN CARMICHAEL Mark Carney and Rick Waugh are two of Canada’s most recognizable figures in the world of finance: Mr. Carney as the leader of a Group of Seven central bank, Mr. Waugh as the chief executive officer of Bank of Nova Scotia, which has the biggest international footprint of all the country’s lenders. This […]

John Greenwood  Canada’s banking regulator is increasing its scrutiny of loans made to consumers especially mortgages. Amid rising concern about the high level of household debt, the Office of the Superintendent of Financial Institutions is “stepping in to increase (its) monitoring” of consumer loans made by the major banks, said the head of the organization. […]