Brokers: You may want to thank one of your own for giving your industry a significant plug in Canada’s largest newspaper.
Brokers: You may want to thank one of your own for giving your industry a significant plug in Canada’s largest newspaper.
“If you lack the expertise to decide on the best time to lock in a rate, find an independent mortgage broker,” Steve Garganis of Mortgage Intelligence says in a new Toronto Star article. “Check with the broker each month on moving from a variable-rate mortgage to a fixed rate.”
In the Toronto Star piece, entitled “How homebuyers can reduce impact of rising rates,” Garganis gives helpful advice to potential clients while also extolling the benefits of working with an independent mortgage broker – a legitimate message, Garganis tells MortgageBrokerNews.ca.
“I believe in that statement (made in the article) -- and sure I’m trying to get the word out and I don’t know of any other industry that can give the kind of advice we can give,” Garganis says. “Bank employees can only give advice on their own products and that advice will only benefit their financial institution.”
However, there was one point made in the article that he wanted to clarify.
“You can ask a lender to hold a mortgage rate, but the current rate is 3.95 per cent for five years for a six-month hold,” he said in the article. “What if rates flatten or fall by late January? You might do better to wait.”
When speaking with MortgageBrokeNews.ca, Garganis elucidated his idea.
“I would say it doesn’t hurt to get the rate hold and it doesn’t cost them anything, and rates have gone up in the last three or four months,” Garganis said. “But will they continue to go up? It doesn’t hurt to get the rate hold but I would keep my eyes open and not just ‘get it and forget.’”
