The recent announcement of expanded 30-year amortization and an increased insured mortgage cap in Ottawa has stirred considerable discussion in the real estate market. Set to take effect on December 15, 2024, these changes promise to reshape the landscape for potential homebuyers. Let’s examine the potential impacts of these new mortgage rules.
Two recent Ottawa Citizen stories included comments from Dan Moloughney, Broker of Record and owner of Ottawa Urban Realty:
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Whether you’re a born-and-raised Ottawan, or are moving to Ottawa from another province, these tips from Ottawa realtors can help start the process
Are you considering a move to or within Ottawa? Is an Ottawa Urban Neighbourhood being considered? Want to walk to work or school? Ottawa used to be a small city with a well defined core of urban neighbourhoods. Certainly Centretown, the Golden Triangle, the Glebe, Lowertown and Sandy Hill would have been considered “urban” for the last 60 to 100 plus years.
According to CMHC-SCHL the Government of Canada just released several tools and resources to help with the First-Time Home Buyer Incentive program.
These include:
1/ the product highlight sheet (PDF)
2/ the online calculator on the government website
3/ all about the program on the government website
4/ all about the process on an awkward government website, that may or may not work for you
Possibly, the most important question is how the “loan” is paid back. According to a quick review of provided info, you can pay back the full loan if you want at any time. If you sell the home you need to pay back as a percentage of the sale price.
For example, you “borrowed” 10% of value of a new home. When you sell you must pay the government of Canada 10% of the sale price, whether value went up or down.
For resale (not new) homes the max is 5% of value.
Why not borrow the full amount you can, and then if value goes up a lot, pay off the full loan just prior to selling? Not yet clear how this would be handled.
I expect there will be MANY more questions about the process and requirements. It really doesn’t seem like the government thought this program through…but it does line up nicely for a fall election.
There is no doubt that first time buyers are finding it MUCH harder to buy a home in the Ottawa market. Hopefully this program will help in a meaningful way.
Buying a home may initially seem daunting but following these steps can help to simplify the process. I see many first time buyers unsure of how to begin searching for a home and these are the tips I give them.