Thursday, 22 November 2012

CMHC has 4 pillars, lots of stats

My wrap on lunch seminar with wraps
By Mark Schadenberg
This past week I attended a seminar (A lunch-and-learn meeting) with two guest speakers – B2B Bank and CMHC.
The B2B is the old Laurentian Bank, which no longer has any focus on branches and personal bank accounts, but rather concentrates on businesses. www.B2Bbank.com is still part of the mortgage writing world, especially when self-employed people are buying a home, but they would most often be contacted by a mortgage broker, such as Rita Nicholson from our Triland-based Dominion Lending Services group (519 636-2946)  
What I really want to write about is another new website: www.everythingyouneed.ca, which could have had even a longer name such as everythingyouneedtoopennewdoors. The site is a Canadian Mortgage and Housing Corporation portal dedicated to assisting Canadians in buying a home. There are amortization charts, mortgage calculators, a glossary of terms, statistics, information on high ratio mortgages, and tips on how to save for a down payment.
CMHC (www.cmhc.ca) is a government agency, which sells mortgage insurance to cover banks from losses in case of a power of sale, but as moderator Joelle Johnson pointed out that is just one of their four pillars.
CMHC is also about research, assistance and a supplier of information for the international look at real estate.  Assistance is all about acting as a funnel of information, but it’s also about understanding that home owners have access to funds to renovate a home for additional specific needs, such as a retro-fit due to mobility issues.
The three-hour seminar, which included great wraps and a chicken salad, also included a boat-load of statistics about who is buying homes and where they are receiving their background research from. You guessed right, the internet is the main source of studying for all home buyers, and likely boat buyers too.
Among the stats delivered was that the average first-time buyer is now 34 and the average second buyer is 47. With the tighter Bank of Canada rules of qualifying for a mortgage and payback schedules, those numbers have recently moved older on the demographic scale.
Social media is also a source for consumer learning, including YouTube with its billions of videos, and Twitter for a search of experts, and Facebook to consult with your friends and family. One of the reasons I blog is to improve my web presence.
I have always said the best place to get your info from is from someone not trying to sell your something. That could be reason one why you consult either CMHC site.  



Mark Schadenberg
Sales Representative
Royal LePage Triland
(519) 537-1553

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