The Canadian Real Estate Pages

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I read this article about about real estate agent websites which I emphatically agree with.

It was written for real estate agents but applies to all industry related service providers such as mortgage agents, movers, interior decorators and so on.  I strongly suggest you read it.

Here is an excerpt and a link to the article itself.

“Few absolutes exist in the world of adapting new technology to the real estate business, but almost everyone will tell you that you must embrace more technology than you will ever really need to. Those experts—and most webmasters and web designers—are operating with the now-obsolete concept that your website must give every possible piece of information that might be real estate related to all visitors.

That entire concept has resulted in a universe where 90% of agents and brokers fail in their Internet marketing efforts. In most industries, failure rates of 90% results in a complete change in the way things get done. In real estate, however, the same old things that don’t work continue to be treated as “must haves” for every agent…”

“Real estate sales have always been and will always be about individual agents, not corporate monoliths, and once that realization dawns on the agent base, perhaps the rate of failure will decrease as online marketing innovation increases.”

When it comes to mortgage financing, more and more Canadians are choosing to work with a professional mortgage broker. According to a recent study by the Canada Mortgage and Housing Corporation (CMHC), 23 per cent of mortgages written were arranged through a broker.

Canadians are just catching up with their American neighbors, who are far less likely to simply walk into their home bank for a mortgage. In 2000, almost 70 per cent of all U.S. mortgages were arranged through mortgage brokers.

If we follow the U.S. model – and it seems that we are — then we’re in for a sea of change in the way Canadians manage their most significant personal asset. It makes sense. After all, investment returns aren’t as lucrative as they were five years ago, and investors are seeking out ways to make financial gains through avenues they may have overlooked.

There are some significant benefits to working with an independent mortgage broker. Firstly, let’s compare mortgage expertise: Most banks have one or more representatives who are specifically assigned to assist with mortgages. Their role is to develop commercial mortgages business for the banks. A ontario mortgage broker, on the other hand, is a trained mortgage professional who has met standards for education. The comprehensive training of an independent mortgage broker may exceed the training of their counterparts at the bank. More importantly, the mortgage broker is independent. He or she is not an employee of a lending institution, but has access to rate and option information for a full spectrum of chartered banks and other lending institutions. Their role is to find the best possible mortgage rates
and options for you.

Let’s also look at choice: A mortgage broker offers you access to many competitive lenders, each with a range of mortgage options. It would take weeks of research, telephoning and personal visits to recreate the range of features and options that a mortgage broker has at his or her fingertips. Rate information, mortgage options and payment schedules are up-to-the-moment, so you and your broker can make valid comparisons of the options available. The result of all this choice is a mortgage which is customized to meet your needs and to save you money.

Also consider accessibility. Your mortgage broker will be available to you before and after your mortgage closes, which will be good news for those who have spent long hours on hold or in a telephone voice answering loop.

Above all, clients have turned to mortgage brokers for better rates. Access to a broad range of lending institutions is a critical advantage for mortgage shoppers. A quarter-point difference on your mortgage rate can add up to thousands of dollars over the life of your mortgage. Many mortgage brokers work inside a brokerage organization with sufficient mortgage volumes that they can negotiate the best possible rates for your situation. Canadian homeowners who have experienced the benefits of a mortgage broker are unlikely to ever return to a world in which they simply accept the best posted rate at their local bank.

Don’t let your excitement and enthusiasm about owning your dream home fade away with a faulty mortgage loan. It is best to calculate a mortgage before you finally take the plunge. Remember the ones that worked out their finances well in advance were the ones that could save their homes in foreclosure in majority of the cases. However, there may be instances when you tend to fall behind on payments for reasons that are beyond your control. For similar reasons it is said that you should always have an emergency fund that you can fall back upon if you face a sudden financial stalemate.

How will you calculate a mortgage to find out if a particular lender is offering you the best deal? First you need to shop around for mortgage quotes from different lenders. Keep your eyes open for the APR or the Annual Percentage Rate and the interest rate. These 2 factors can make a lot of difference to your mortgage payments as a whole. Although mortgage APR doesn’t affect your monthly mortgage payments since it is the total cost of the loan, the interest rate does.

Mortgage calculators can help you immensely when you calculate a mortgage monthly payment. What are the factors that you need to consider when you calculate a mortgage?

• Take the monthly principal as well as interest payment into account depending on the size of the mortgage you have taken out.

• Term of the loan – You may either opt for 30-year loan term or 15-year loan term. In case of 30-year loan term you will pay less every month but it will attract higher rate of interest. This is in sharp contrast to a 15-year loan term where the interest rate will be low but the amount you pay each month will be high.

• Rate of interest – Decide whether you want to opt for fixed-rate mortgage (FRM) or adjustable-rate mortgage (ARM). If you take out a mortgage as per ARM, your mortgage payments will fluctuate depending on the conditions in the mortgage market since the ARM is connected with the market rates. On the other hand if you opt for FRM, your mortgage payments remain constant throughout the term of the loan. FRM makes your mortgage payments foreseeable.
• Calculate property taxes that you are required to pay each year. Since you are calculating the monthly payments, divide the same by 12.

• Find out the PMI or the Private Mortgage Insurance if you require one.
• Once you have got the above figures, you can add them up to get the final payment that you are required to make every month.

Getting hold of a mortgage calculator isn’t difficult as there are many websites that offer mortgage calculator for free. And calculate a mortgage using calculators of more than one site as it will help you to check for errors.

It was recently decided that the Canadian Real Estate Pages was due for an upgrade.

The website recently celebrated over 10 years on the Internet and with the new technologies and social networking aspects inherent in Web 2.0  it was decided that we would combine the previous functions of our website with that of a blog site. We hope to add a lot more interesting content as well as get some contributors from across the country involved.

For those of you visiting us for the first time, you may feet that the site is a little small for such a big topic as real estate in Canada. In fact, we have received e-mails from visitors from other countries in the past asking for listing information about homes in Vancouver and Toronto in the same breath.  The size of our country is simply not comprehensible to people from smaller regions. Of course we referred the leads to real estate agents from those locations who advertise with us  as we always do.

So! We hope you will appreciate the new look and feel but more importantly that you will come back again and again and be able to find the type of information you are looking for.

Any comments about our posts, posts written by our contributors or about any information we can help you find would be appreciated.

Initially,  the Pages were developed as a portal to help promote the many related services on the web, but it seems that many business owners with websites still do not appreciate the value of links from high ranking sites  will have to there own. Over time our rank has declined and we are in the process of improving that as well.

If you would  like to become a contributor please send us an email or simply repond in a comment.

We look forward to hearing from you.