Canadians are back to using their homes as ATMs. Office of the Superintendent of Financial Institutions (OSFI) filings show the balance of loans secured by homes reached a new record high in February. Preliminary numbers show most of the growth is still from personal loans, such as HELOCs.
Canadians Used Over $298 Billion In Home Equity To Secure Loans
The total of loans secured with residential loans ripped to a new all-time high. Over $298 billion worth of loans were secured by residential property in February, up 0.43% from the month before. This works out to a 5.4% increase compared to last year. That makes February the second largest for annual growth since at least 2012. Breaking this number down, we can see what they’re using it for.
Total Loans Secured With Residential Real Estate
The total of personal and business loans, secured with residential real estate.
Source: Regulatory Filings, Better Dwelling.
Over $266 Billion In Home Equity Is Securing Personal Loans
Showing huge gains, but still below the record, is personal loans secured by home equity. The outstanding balance of personal loans hit $266 billion in February, up 0.3% from the month before. The 12 month pace of growth hit 5.99%, once again the second highest growth for February since at least 2012.
Personal Loans Secured With Residential Real Estate
The total of personal loans, secured with residential real estate.
Source: Regulatory Filings, Better Dwelling.
Over $32 Billion In Home Equity Is Securing Business Loans
At a multi-month high is home equity used to secure business loans. The balance of business loans secured by homes reached $32 billion in February, up 1.56% from the month before. The 12 month pace of growth reached 0.74%, the lowest for the month in over 7 years of data. Yes, the growth in this segment is not even keeping up with the pace of inflation.
Business Loans Secured With Residential Real Estate
The total of business loans, secured with residential real estate.
Source: Regulatory Filings, Better Dwelling.
Canadians are still tapping their home equity in record numbers, but it is slowing down. Personal loans remain below the peak reached last year. Although the growth of equity being tapped is outpacing the growth of home prices.
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So personal loans secured by real estate has gone from ~ $220B to $266B since 2012 up 21%
How much has Cdn Real Estate gone up since 2012 ? I think more ? Although maybe not in Calgary, Edmonton or Regina.
Toronto in the 2012 average price was $497k now $776k up 56% (TREB)
So less leverage today ?
is the debt being serviced though? or are they defaulting?
Hard to say as the reporting on that is always 6-12 months behind. So far the only thing we know is that Hoyes Michalos is saying they have absolute record business with monthly increases in consumer proposal and bankruptcy clients. We likely won’t see the entire picture for awhile yet, as power of sale isn’t even reported in the numbers. Also note that when the economy is strong you obviously see less defaulting… but the second it turns even slightly you see a massive increase… and right now we’re looking at a global growth slowdown.
Also my father in law, a mortgage broken for york region, said that his business went from 9/10 clients looking to buy a house, to 4/10 looking for loan bailouts to pay their mortgage, 5/10 attempts to get home equity or refinancing to afford payments they took out in the last two years, and 1/10 looking to purchase a home. Sure that is one person, but he said that the people he knows in the industry are all saying roughly the same thing right now. Of course that’s a small sample size and could be constrained to York Region, but I guess we’ll find out in the coming year or two how bad it really is.
I think this can be explained by the influx of high net worth immigrants, overseas investors, and the booming money laundering business.
The average Canadian is probably more exposed, with higher lending rates to boot.
It is a good observation that you made though.
Definitely being service or foreclosures would be spiking – and they aren’t.
It looks like a slow day here on the comments section of BD. Therefore, I thought I’d share some excerpts I came across today. If any board also finds them interesting, it would be this one:
From article dated May 21st, 2005 https://www.google.ca/amp/s/www.latimes.com/archives/la-xpm-2005-may-21-fi-green21-story,amp.html
‘Federal Reserve Chairman Alan Greenspan said Friday that some regional housing markets were showing signs of unsustainable speculation and “froth” and that there were “a lot” of local housing bubbles.’
‘It’s pretty clear that it’s an unsustainable underlying pattern,” the Fed chief said. “People are reaching to be able to pay the prices to be able to move into a home.”’
‘Some economists suggested that Greenspan was partly to blame for the overheated housing market. By letting short-term interest rates hit rock bottom as a means to help the economy recover from the 2001 recession, the central bank helped drive down mortgage rates. That in turn created an exaggerated demand for housing’
The reason I mention those excerpts is because I hear a lot of people saying housing bubbles are a local thing in the Canadian economy. However, it looks like they were saying the same thing in the States back in 05. Further, the interest rate dropping is almost bang on with current Canada as well. The gov can’t raise rates (highly unlikely) and the possibility is there that the rates could drop. I just don’t see them hiking rates. Finally, who would have questioned Greenspan prior to the bubble burst? I know I wouldn’t have/didn’t. Sometimes, those big guns need to be questioned.
Anyhow, happy Easter everyone! Have a great weekend.
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Nobody in this world should listen to Alan Greenspan. He is beyond an idiot and was the the driving force and cause of the housing collapse in the US. He is on record as saying he can guarantee perpetual prosperity through his expert experience and knowledge. He was the cause and should be exposed as the root cause of the greatest economic collapse since the last depression. The U.S. is broke and living well beyonds it’s means because of QE easing……basically the largest counterfeit operation in the history of the world.
Canada is fooling itself by thinking it is different here. Our housing bubble is gigantic compared to what happened in the U.S. We are not different and special. History repeats itself over and over by people who think it is different this time.
This guy gets it.
We worship these bloodsuckers and imbeciles like greenspan/bernanke and whoever the latest moron at the fed is, when they themselves are the causes of these massive boom/bust cycles.
Normal boom/bust cycles eliminate weak players and make the system stronger. But when you give out easy 0% credit for over a decade you inflate huge asset bubbles, create zombie companies and banks, create massive inequality (asset holders vs everyone, boomers vs millenials), inflation that penalizes the poor (they hold cash farther from the printing press).
This results in huge blowups instead of downturns which are healthy.
The ultimate end game to all this is massive bail ins for banks(goodbye depositors), wealth taxes on assets and perhaps collapse of the currency.
Economist should literally be shot in the street.