“Chartered Banks Take The Lead In Announcing Long Term Mortgage Rate Increases”

With the Royal Bank and TD Canada Trust Leading the way, CIBC announced today that they are following suit and have increased their long term fixed residential mortgage rates.

While there will be slight variations among the players, the basic rate increase will go like this:

• 20 basis points on the three year fixed rate
• 40 basis points on the four year fixed rate
• 60 basis points on the five year fixed rate

In the current market, this is viewed to be a pretty aggressive rate hike that was potentially been fueled by the Bank of Canada stating recently that they may be raising their over night lender rate soon.

And even though the central bank still says they are committed to keeping interest rates down, there appears to be enough inflationary pressure in the market right now to push the prime lending rate up as the primary goal of the central bank is to keep inflation at or below 2%.

While not all mortgage lenders have announced an increase in their rates, you can bet that everyone else is going to fall into line in the coming days.  So while there may still be some short term opportunity to get the old rates, its likely not going to last very long.

And this may not be the last fixed mortgage rate increase we see this year.  As the general economy continues to recover, there is a very good chance an additional rate hike could be seen in the coming months.

But then again, it may not.  Interest rates can be very hard to predict at the best of times, but under the current economic conditions where many will argue that rates are being kept artificially low, the ability to forecast with any sort of accuracy is really out the window.

Bottom line is we now have the first significant rate move in over a year and rates in general are more likely to increase further, its just a matter of when and how much.

If you’d like to better understand how the rate increases may impact a mortgage financing decision you’re looking at, please give me a call and we’ll work through the relevant scenarios and math together to see what makes the most sense for your situation and requirements.

Click Here To Speak With Mortgage Broker Joe Walsh.

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