Hi every peeps
just a short enquiry;-is anyone experiencing difficulties in securing a mortgage
when they get into their chosen area.
with the credit crunch are banks looking for bigger and bigger deposits?
we hope to settle in the moncton area and have seen some great houses and can,t seem to get any answers from immigration services.
do banks there want the usual 5% or higher?
good luck to all

Moncton, eh? Try this guy. He did alright by us and can probably answer your questions with more accuracy.

You wont get a 5% mortgage straight away as a new immigrant, you will have to establish a credit rating first. This will take 6 - 12 months.

If you want to buy as soon as you land, you will need a deposit of at least 25% and to be able to show that you can make the mortgage payments.

Personally my advice is to rent for the first year, that way you get to know the area(s) and can pick an area that is right for you and your family from personal experience.

I totally think that this advice here is the best idea I know so many people who bought straight away without knowing where they were buying that are now unhappy and want to move

I would also say that when you first arrive that you are very much in limbo for a good few months and therefore need to adjust yourself to life here before making such a huge commitment.

Take 12 months to chill and relax in a rental and then go for the area which you KNOW you want to live in and not where you THINK you want to live.

A mortgage broker drew a complete blank for us, but HSBC came through. They were able to offer me a mortgage based on my UK credit rating, up to the maximum allowed 95% of house value even though I had only been in work for a week or two and had been in the country for less than three months. You will need a permanent job, and if there is a probationary period, you'll have to wait until that is over.

We have banked with HSBC for years, so I don't know if they would be able to do the same for new customers.

I do have the slight advantage of having a Canadian wife, but that didn't seem to help in mortgage applications. She was on a temporary contract, so I was eligible for a mortgage and she was not!

[QUOTE=MB-Realtor;7916930]You wont get a 5% mortgage straight away as a new immigrant, you will have to establish a credit rating first. This will take 6 - 12 months.

Hi

We rented for 6 months before applying for pre-approval on a mortgage. We were not PR's nor did we have the 10/20% deposit required to put down. (We have only been here total 10 months and we've been in our own place 1 month).

Previous poster is spot on with regards to the permanent job and your probationary periods being over. Hence why its good to rent, get your feet under the table, settled and over the initial move!

Our mortgage broker secured us pre-approval on a 5% mortgage via Coastal Community Credit Union and HRMC (Thinks that it...if you can't get the deposit together then the HRMC secures the loan by adding a fee to your mortgage....the banks then will lend to you).

If you prefer not to pay this wedge (we paid 5% deposit and was peeved that $11k was put back on the mortgage as the security for HMRC - but even Canadians have to pay this! - so you either save for the 10%/20% or pay HRMC)

We had our Credit reports from the UK - Creditexpert.co.uk (there are others) and this helped to show that we had good standing in the UK with our creditors. They will ask questions and as long as you have the explanations/information they take the report as written.

A mortgage broker may be a good bet.....ours helped immensely by portraying our personal circumstances. The fact our Passports were in mid-air on their way to the UK to be given PR was a pain! It was a rigmoral trying to prove we were going to get it - but we did it.

If you can email a broker before you leave - they can let you know what is required and the hoops you may have to jump through. (You can search www.yellowpages.ca and your local area to find local to where you wish to live etc).

HSBC Bank may well be able to do the same before you leave - I guess you could converse with any Canadian bank before you leave the UK to find out the score.

Good luck with what you decide...

Natalie

so you either save for the 10%/20% or pay HRMC)

I don't know the acronym HRMC. I Googled and plenty of responses, but none I could find relating to mortgages. Could you please tell what it means?

Does she mean CMHC? Not sure even that makes sense in the context.

There is always a probationary period as laid out by the employment standards act. A written contract can specify a shorter time, but not longer. If it is not in writing, an employer may terminate an employee without notice anytime up to 3 months after the commencement of work.

Well my apologies again! Yes was CMHC - and for further clarity heres a more "sensible" written answer for you!

Default insurance

Subject to the rules and regulations of the National Housing Act, if the amount of your down payment is less than 20% of the value or purchase price of your property, you are required to have default insurance in order to protect against a loss in the event of default.

The Canada Mortgage and Housing Corporation is a Federal Government Agency that provides default insurance.

The insurance premium will often be added to the amount of your new mortgage loan. If you sell your home and purchase another, your mortgage may be ported to the new property along with the insurance premium you have already paid (subject to standard credit approval).

Its a lump sum added to your mortgage for the life of the mortgage - A fair few grand (ours was $11k). So you either add this lump onto the mortgage and buy your home or wait and save your downpayment - making your mortgage less per month!

Hope this helps OP.

N

Ok - got you. Seems like it's the same as mortgage indemnity in the UK.

Except its mandatory if you put down less than 20% down (was set at 25% but they brought it down last year). If only the US had the same system - unfortunately they opted for the exact opposite - huge tax incentives to leverage up to the hilt.....