The Canadian Mortgage Housing Corporation (CMHC) just released their latest Canadian Housing Market Outlook for Q2 2008. There are some intersting facts in the report, including:

Mortgage rates

Mortgage rates are expected to remain low through the end of 2009

However, rising house prices will continue to push mortgage carrying costs higher

As a result, this will ease housing demand, particularly for first-time buyers

Both short and long term interest rates will be fairly stable going forward, however, global market instability is still a major risk to interest rate movements

Longer term mortgage rates, such as the five year fixed rate, will stay low but will trend gradually higher between 2009 and 2011 – to give you an idea of what the current situation, today’s best 5 year closed fixed rate on RateSupermarket.ca is Canadian Tire Bank’s @ 4.99%

Housing market

Outlook for the housing market is positive for the near term

Housing starts will remain above the 200,000 unit threshold for a seventh consecutive year in 2008

The average MLS® price will increase by 5.1% in 2008 and 3.3% in 2009

This view is shared by Scotiabank, as reported by Macleans who have been anticipating lower sales this year and more modest price increases,” said Warren, senior economist at Scotia Economics, after the bank forecast overall sales 15 per cent below last year’s record levels, with home prices increasing on average about five per cent

In light of this new information from CMHC we’ve updated our best mortgage rates for each province pages with the new data, so have a look.

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