No Canadian housing bubble: Bank of Canada deputy governor

Vancouver Sun- The Canadian housing market is strong, but it is not experiencing a bubble, Paul Jenkins, senior deputy governor of the Bank of Canada, said Monday.

The federal government said last week it will bring in new mortgage rules to cool the housing sector and prevent home buyers, tempted by record low interest rates, from overextending themselves.

At the same time, it said there was no housing bubble, a point echoed on Monday by Jenkins, who was speaking at a panel discussion at the Government of Canada and Financial Times Global Business Leaders Day in Vancouver, where the housing market is especially hot…

No Canadian housing bubble: Bank of Canada deputy governor

Central bank urged to hike interest rates after June

Times Colonist- The Bank of Canada should uphold its conditional pledge to keep its key policy rate at 0.25 per cent until July but should then embark on sharp rate hikes of 50 basis points at every announcement date until mid-2011, says an analysis prepared for the C.D. Howe Institute.

The call for sharp rate increases after June emerged yesterday, one week before the Bank of Canada releases its latest interest-rate statement. Recent data indicate the Canadian economy likely expanded in the final quarter of 2009 at a faster pace than the central bank expected (four per cent versus 3.3 per cent), and inflation is now closer to the central bank’s two per cent preferred target than it previously envisaged…

Central bank urged to hike interest rates after June

Keen interest in mortgage interest

Vancouver Sun- When Toronto resident Celia Bernath files her annual income tax return, she includes a long list of deductions from her home-office income. After all, as a chartered accountant, she knows that travel, bank charges, postage, courier, utility and other expenses are fair game for the micro-entrepreneur. But the item that sometimes has the most impact is deducting a proportion of her residential mortgage interest.

“The mortgage-interest deduction — like other deductions — is based on the square footage of my office divided by the total square footage of the house. Keeping track of all your household expenses is very important,” says Ms. Bernath who has about 15 corporate and 100 personal clients.

Ms. Bernath is one of the more than 700,000 home-based business owners who might be eligible to deduct a portion of their mortgage interest on their principal residence as an expense…

Keen interest in mortgage interest

January home sales slip from previous month

Financial Post- Existing home sales declined on a monthly basis for the first time in more than a year but it may only be a temporary decline as new government regulations are expected to boost the spring market.

The Canadian Real Estate Association said yesterday January sales nationally were down 2.8% on a seasonally adjusted basis from December, the first time activity has fallen in 13 months. Despite the decline, January 2010 sales were 58% higher than a year earlier.

"January results suggest that the national resale housing market may be past the recent peak," said Gregory Klump, chief economist with CREA…

January home sales slip from previous month

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