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Trudeau Likely Just Getting Started on Housing Tweaks
- Banking regulator tightens rules on lower-ratio mortgages
- Economists expect government to follow suit on loans it backs
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Almost as soon as it was announced, the Canadian government’s first attempt to rein in the country’s pandemic housing boom was dismissed as not enough.
Canada’s banking regulator signaled its intent Thursday to take a small step by tightening qualification rules for uninsured mortgages, worried that low interest rates will put new home buyers too far into debt. The move will effectively reduce by about 4% the size of mortgages households will be eligible to take.