July 2015

Getting Easier to Borrow with a Secondary Suite...

Posted on Jul 28, 2015

The rules around the income from rental units considered in home loan applications submitted to the CMHC are changing.

The agency announced Monday that, from September 28, it will allow 100 per cent of the rental income from a unit to be considered for new loan applications submitted to it for mortgage insurance.

That means that a secondary rentals s...

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Historic Low Interest Rates! Why? What does it mean?

Posted on Jul 22, 2015

The Bank of Canada announced July 15 that it is lowering its target for the overnight rate by one-quarter of one percentage point to 1/2 per cent. The Bank Rate is correspondingly 3/4 per cent and the deposit rate is 1/4 per cent.What Will It Mean for Variable and Fixed Rates?
How will the BoC’s latest rate cut affect variable mortgage rates?When th...

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The Talking Points In Every Vancouver Real Estate Conversation 

Posted on Jul 19, 2015

I recently mailed a marketing flyer to homeowners in West Vancouver. It spoke of how I would market their homes to engage with Chinese buyers in order to maximize the sale price for the homeowner. My Chinese buyer agent translated portions into Mandarin. A week later I received my flyer returned in the mail with a yellow sticky note with the word...

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What is the Chinese QDII2 Overseas Investment Scheme and What It Means for Canada

Posted on Jul 05, 2015

China will soon launch a new pilot scheme in six cities allowing individuals to invest directly overseas, the official Securities Times reported on Tuesday, potentially unleashing billions of dollars in Chinese savings on global stock and bond markets.

The Qualified Domestic Individual Investor program, commonly known as QDII2, is the second iterati...

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China's Open Markets Mean Half A Trillion Dollars In New Liquidity*

Posted on Jul 05, 2015

Think back to the days of the commodity boom. Real early. Like 1999. Investment gurus like Jim Rogers spoke about what will happen to raw materials prices — from iron ore to soybeans — when half the population of China goes from eating a pound of chicken a week, to two pounds. Or when China goes from building one building a week, to the equivalent...

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