Do you have a green mortgage and a green home?

Hey everyone, hope Father's Day is off to a good start on this sunny day in Montreal. Today, I got inspired to write about having a green home. Often we all talk about being green by participating in our city's recycling and composting programs. I think we are all pretty green minded but post-recycling and car pooling we're not sure what next.

Personally, I don't think we do enough for the environment nor are living in a sustainable manner. As home owners or future home owners there are three ways you can help your pocket and help the environment, by: either buying an energy efficient home, making energy efficient renovations to your new home or renovate your existing home.

When buying an energy efficient home (or making energy efficient saving renovations), should you meet certain criteria both CMHC and Genworth will refund 10% of your insurance premium. On a mortgage of $200,000 you would save approximately $500 on your premium. According to the Quebec Government, by making these changes you'd save approximately 20% on your energy costs. Furthermore, through the Quebec Government's Novoclimat 2.0 Program you'd receive an additional $1000 in financial assistance. Is saving $1500 upfront and 20% on your energy bills enough? Let's take this discussion a bit further...

As many of your know I like Mike Holmes and the innovative ideas he shares. If you read his website you will see lots of green home ideas, which includes: roofing, heating and cooling, alternative lighting, power, and improving the building envelope. The aspect I find most interesting is water use. Mike talks about greywater, which is "used water that comes from sinks and drains, as well as reclaimed rainwater collected from a home’s roofs." The greywater is then held, filtered and sent back into the house for re-use. The water cannot be used for drinking, showering or bathing but definitely useful for watering the lawn, laundry, washing your car, and flushing toilets.

Mike states there are no Federal or Provincial building guidelines for greywater systems. In addition "Each individual municipality accepts or rejects proposed greywater systems that homeowners might want to install."

I am glad that Mike and people like him are sharing these ideas. I just wish our governments were a bit more ahead of the times by adopting more green building codes and help bring these topics into mainstream discussion.

Flaherty Announces New Mortgage Rules

Yesterday, Mr. Flaherty, Finance Minister,  made some aggressive changes to the mortgage rules in an attempt to slow down the rate that people are borrowing on home equity and to slow down the real estate market.
 

Here is a summary of the changes:

1) Amortization reduced from 30 down to 25 years on government backed mortgages (i.e. insured mortgages)
2) Max Loan To Value for Refinancing 80% of your home's market value
3) No CMHC backing for Properties over $1M (client must put down 20%)
4) Gross Debt Service ratio increased to 39% Total Debt Service ratio remains at 44% 

Please note as a repercussion of this announcement today the banks will start to implement the new rules over the next couple of weeks to meet with the July 9th deadline. Mortgages that have already been approved and are in the process of being funded will not be affected by these changes however any future transactions will have to be qualified under the new rules.

The question is: What does this mean for the average Canadian? The government believes that this will help halt an ever increasing housing market and will stop Canadians from using their homes as ATMs to pull cash out of equity.

It remains to be seen if the banks will continue to offer 30 and 35 year amortizations on non government backed mortgages. The government believes that only 5% of Canadians will be affected by these new rules.We did have some good news today as well with respect to these changes. Canadians will still be able to secure a home with only a 5% down payment as well as the increase in the GDS ratio will allow more room for certain families to qualify for homes.

As always I am available to answer all your questions please feel free to contact me. Have a good long weekend everyone.

Genworth and CMHC Mortgage Assistance Coordinates

Hey everyone, I had a quite a bit of feedback and calls in response to my blog post related to Home Owner Assistance Programs. Thanks for the feedback and glad to hear that the information was useful. I got a couple calls requesting Genworth's and CMHC's mortgage assistance coordinates. I thought I'd post them in case others might need them too. If you don't remember if you are insured with the CMHC or Genworth then simply call your bank and ask. They will know.

Genworth Financial Canada
1-800-511-8888
http://www.homeownerassistance.ca

Canadian Mortgage and Housing Corporation (CMHC)
1-866-358-9999 and ask for a default agent or "agent gestion défaut"

Homeowner Assistance Programs

Hope everyone’s had a good week. In this week’s blog, I’dlike to talk a little about mortgage assistance programs. Mortgage assistanceprograms are aimed to help Canadian homeowners who are having temporary trouble making their mortgage payments. Common situations like job loss,reduced income, marital separation, or unexpected illness and disabilityclearly contribute to one’s ability to their mortgage. In order to qualify forsuch programs you first need to have had bought or refinanced your home witheither the Canadian Mortgage and HousingCorporation (CMHC) or GenworthFinancial which are the two major mortgage insurers in Canada. In otherwords, you needed to have picked up some mortgage or aka default insurance inthe past.  

If you find yourself having trouble paying your mortgage dueto one of the reasons listed above then its best you speak to your bank aboutyour options. I suggest this be done before you becomes late on payments and itbecomes a problem. Together your bank and your insurer will discuss yoursituation and if possible create a plan that helps you out. The mortgage insurershave specialists that deal with such matters. Some options permit you toincrease your amortization, defer payments or even create a shared paymentplan.

I don’t think enough homeowners are aware that such programsexist.  If you feel you need assistancewith your mortgage I would be more than happy to guide you to the best of myabilities regardless if you become a client or not. I am more interested inhelping you get back on track. After all there are bigger things to worry aboutin life.

If you have any specific questions or good and badexperiences you’d like to share please feel free to contact me. I welcometopics for next week’s blog.