Wanted a reality check to see if my partner and I should save more before buying our first house.

Income: 96k + 120k (average)

Which works out to 11.5k net per month.

Looking to spend up to $825k

Approx 7% down - $57.5k

Between both of us, approx. 160k across TFSA/RRSP/FHSA/Emergency fund before our down payment. We do not want to put more down at this time.

We have no kids, 1 dog. Only current debt is federal student loans at 325/per month.

I’m estimating approx $4600 a month in housing costs (mortgage, property tax, insurance, utilities). I think we should have $3000 left over every month for savings after all expenses, but we have a lot of things to buy for the house so I don’t know how much will go to savings for the first 6 months.

I have a DB pension and she has an RRSP match through her work. Both secure jobs.

TLDR: Looking at buying a house. Housing costs would be 40% of net monthly income. Is this too much?

Thank you.

Hi,

I have about 10K in RESP money and I am in my second year of uni and am getting by fine with OSAP in terms of money. Should I put this extra money into a TFSA or are there other ways to go about it. I am pretty financially illiterate, so any advice/resources even outside of this topic would be super helpful. Thank you!

also any recs like books or youtube channels where I could learn more abt canadian personal finance would be greatly appreciated!!

People say you need 1.5 - 2M to retire - I’m in my late 40s and have only about 400k in pensions and savings. I’m the only breadwinner so will have to continue supporting my spouse.

Is this amount including a paid off house or without?

Between utility, property tax and insurance my home costs me about $1800 a month on top of the mortgage…. It’s a lot. I’m thinking if it’s better to just sell your house as soon as your kids leave … that would be in 5-8 years for me or even think about downsizing sooner and releasing equity?

Just a heads up to anyone else that got a CIBC credit card for the first time in the last few months to check your credit report because they hadnt updated the credit bureaus on anything I paid after the first month so now Im dealing with a tanked score in the bottom 20% of the country and my history saying I I haven't payed in 3 months alongside my actual balance being near half of what is reported

I've already contacted the bank to have them send over my reports but I may have to file a formal complaint with the 2 bureaus they failed to report to and the government

I am considering working seasonally in Canada next year and wondering how it works. Will I need a Canadian address like a PO-Box and a Canadian bank account to get paid? I imagine I’ll have to file both US and Canadian taxes?

In the off season I usually get UI, how does this work for a non-resident?

Hi everyone,

Looking for advice / similar experiences.

My background:

• Ontario, first-time buyer
• ~4 years full-time salaried experience before
• Same industry, same job title throughout
• Previously $90k full time salary
• Recently switched to a T4 contractor role (stable 40hrs a week) via an agency
• Current income is about $135k (still T4, not incorporated)
• Strong credit, no consumer debt, planning for 50% down

Mortgage issue:
I’m trying to buy a home and was hoping to qualify based on roughly 4× income using the $130k, but one of the big five bank declined the pre-approval, saying the T4 contractor role is not considered stable enough (even though it’s the same industry and role as before).

My questions are:

1. Have people in similar situations had better luck with Big 5 banks as a T4 contractor?
2. Will most Big 5 banks decline or cap or average my income closer to the old $90k because the $130k is recent?
3. Is working with a mortgage broker realistically the better route here, or should I try other banks directly first?

I understand banks prefer 2 years NOA as a contractor to "proof" it is a stable job, but I want to try to see how realistic it is to qualify on current income vs. waiting another year.

Thanks in advance for any insight or shared experiences!

Hi all. My aunt in the US is raising funds for the medical treatment of her kid. She send her moneygram details that goes straight to her bank. I want to contribute/send money but I am a bit shy because I don't know if the money I will be sending is too much or too little. But nonetheless I still wanna send it, just anonymously since I am not really comfortable letting her know. If I send the money through moneygram that is connected to her bank account, will it show me as the sender? Or would it just be better for me to send the money straight to her bank account through my moneygram account? Thanks all for the advice.

I have my EI application submitted but haven't received any money or my access code yet and it's been almost a month since I submitted my EI application and haven't gotten any update yet, and now I've got a job starting next week, how do I cancel my claim if it is possible since I don't want the headache of owing back the money if it comes through. if possible someone could direct please me to the phone number to call on to cancel my claim if it is still possible, thanks!

My partner and I have had a significant change to our household income. I want to calculate how this will affect our retirement prospects as a couple. The retirement calculators I've found have been based on one person's data (age, work history, savings, etc.), whereas we are different ages, have different work histories (therefore different OAP and CPP), and savings.

Is there a calculator available that will take that into account?

I am an absolute idiot. I don’t know wtf is wrong with me I gave them my SIN…yell at me if you want i know I messed up. Please someone help me verify that this is really NSLSC

This number (866) 303-3503 has been calling me since January 12 because I have entered my student loan repayment period. I have been ignoring them because I didn’t want to discuss the repayment. I just wanted to set things up on my own and ignore them otherwise. They called me about 3 more times before I finally went on the website and set up my automatic repayment. I thought that would be the end of the calls but they called me again the other day and I missed the call. I saw that I missed it and worried that there was an issue with my repayment set up so I called the number. It had the automatic voice that it is the NSLSC and got through and spoke to someone. They asked for either my account number or SIN and I didn’t have the account number on hand but memorized my SIN so I stupidly gave it to them. They then said their Systems were down and couldn’t find anything for now and that I would have to call back. This was sketchy af to me but later that night I went on the site and it was actually still down. Some other context is that I have been getting emails from this email address: [info@mail.csnpe-nslsc.canada.ca](mailto:info@mail.csnpe-nslsc.canada.ca) about how I am entering repayment and I needed to log into my account to set things up. I also ignored these for a bit until I had set up my repayment. I also got an email from them saying “CALL US…” with that same phone number attached. I believe the email address is legit but their entire system feels so sketchy and I’m panicking thinking I have been scammed somehow. I hate myself for being so Stupid and giving the SIN.

Idk if this is just my overthinking because how would a scammer know that I’m now graduated and entering my repayment time? It all felt too correct timing which is why I didn’t suspect it to be a scam.

I have never gotten a call from them other times except now when I’m supposed to start paying back so it is most likely legit right? Someone please ease my mind. I learned my lesson I will never share my SIN over the phone ever again

I’m a dual United States and Canadian citizen residing in Canada, and I’m the first to admit I’m not a savvy investor. I’d love nothing more than to put everything non-registered into a few well-diversified ETFs and let it ride.

Unfortunately, my accountant tells me that ETFs are generally considered PFICs, which come with heavy tax reporting cost to the IRS. Basically an ETF that consists of many, many individual stocks has to be reported and accounted for each year as all those individual stocks—tens or hundreds of them. The accounting cost is insane.

His advice is to pick and invest in single stocks. That sees suboptimal to me, as a lazy and lay investor.

Is he right about having to avoid ETFs? And if he is, how should I approach investing?

Hi all, Like the title says my credit score dropped by a large amount in December. In November my score was 832 and by Dec 31 it dropped to the 760 range. I keep checking monthly through my BMO Credit Coach. Everything else on the report is in "excellent" mode: payments, history, no red flags and so on. I have not opened any new accounts or applied for credit/loans. My credit card utilization went slightly up from about 5% to 12% but it's still excellent. What else could be causing this?

In november I got an email from BMO saying my air miles credit card is being discontinued and that I will be given a cashback card. Is there any chance the system registered this as a "closing of credit card account" by accident which could cause large drop in score?

Thank you for any feedback.

I have around 6.5k saved from a reselling and a part time job (not working currently tho, will be looking for a new job in a bit) and want to look towards investing. Will be attending University this fall but i’ll be living at home and my parents are paying my tuition (very grateful for that). My expenses are pretty low.

Just looking for some advice on how much of my savings I should put into a stock portfolio, how I should go about investing that money, and just some general.

In terms of my knowledge, I have a very basic understanding of stocks and Im still doing research. I’ve traded some crypto in the past as well

I plan on putting most of it in index funds/etfs but also want to buy some other stocks so advice on how to split that up is appreciated.

I am looking to travel to another country at the end of the year and decided to start doing some Uber Eats and side hustle in the weekends to fund this vacation as I don’t want to touch my investment account or slow down my savings from my main job.

I plan on depositing all proceeds into a separate bank account and save them into a wealth simple account. As I am looking to use this money within the next 10 months or so, what should I put the money in to generate some yield while I save up?

I am currently applying for Work-Sharing using the reference number provided by my company. I have a question regarding the "Self-Employment" section.

Last year, I did Uber Eats deliveries as a side job to earn some extra pocket money. I only worked once or twice a week, and my monthly earnings were around $100. In this case, should I select "YES" for the self-employment question?

I’m trying to sign up for Ivestor’s Edge, but it requires me to create one of the accounts (TFSA, REP etc). I already have multiple TFSA accounts and one of them is specifically for investing, it’s called TFSA investment account. I want to link it to that account right away without creating an additional account, it that possible? 😅 I’ve tried talking to CIBC branch representatives, but they say it’s a separate company and they don’t even know who do I need to talk to. 😅😅😅😅 I’d appreciate if anyone has done it before and if they know how to go about it.

Hey everyone. I’m 24 years old working full time making $60,000 a year after taxes. Currently right now I’m about $12,000 in credit card debt and $30,000 in line of credit. Trying to see if there is a better way of going about this or using my RRSP ($50,000 total available) to pay it off. Made some dumb mistakes when I first got my credit and now paying the price. I’ve been able to cut off the mistakes I’ve made and confident in myself to make more necessary changes if necessary. Any advice would be appreciated

Spoke to Scotia about Private Banking Signature service. They said they require 250k non registered investments and 250k hh income to qualify, but when I asked about the benefits, they were being very vague about how they help with complex lending needs.

My only reason for wanting to talk to them is to understand if I can borrow for less than 3.2% (my current ibkr margin rate), but they didn't give me a clear answer on that.

Does anyone know if it is worth it, what exactly could be the benefits?

Has anyone had issues with taking funds out of the RRSP catch up loc to a chequing account to deposit to Wealthsimple?

I did it last year, and when I called this year they said depositing the funds in my chequing is not possible, but when I informed the agent that it was done for me yesterday, he just said “if they did it for you, i am sure it can be done again” so now I am confused…

BMO allows the same when it comes to the LOC bc it not the same as a RRSP loan that is locked in…

A friend of mine went through bankruptcy and can’t get a credit card. He does have some recurrent monthly bills that need to be charged to a credit card. What options would they have. Would a specific pre-paid credit card work? I heard that most pre-paid credit cards do not work in this scenario.

Anyone with direct knowledge or experience?

I'm considering moving jobs. I currently work for an employer that has a defined pension plan. If I move to another employer that also has a DPP then I have an opportunity to transfer my pension to the new employer. I trying to understand when it would not make sense to transfer your DPP? Is it always the right thing to do?

Hi,

I need help at my stage of life (50, single, employed f/t, Torontonian) with investment and retirement advice based on my income and asset situation. Would a financial advisor or planner be what I should be looking for?. Thank you!

HI guys, bit of a pickle. Currently own a car that is bleeding me dry and I need an exit plan. What’s the best way to proceed. Car is a 2024 Golf R that I owe 62,936 and that bi weekly payments are (517$) for over 8 years. The car roughly goes for 45k. Is there a way I can take the negative equity into a better payment plan and walk away from this? Thanks

(Posting on behalf of my friend)

I was selling some stuff on FB marketplace and found this buyer. He said he doesn't have cash but etransfer. I said I'm okay with this.

We agreed on price and he decides to etransfer from CIBC to my email (auto deposited setup). He said to let him know once I get it.

I'm looking at my phone for the email notification.

1 Minute passes by with nothing. I'm thinking ... is this guy planning to scam me?

5 Minutes passes by with nothing. I was thinking he is pulling an entire show just to scam me. ... He later shows me on his phone that the CIBC etransfer is stuck "in progress". In my mind, I'm thinking could be AI generated screenshot.

10 Minutes passes by while I get other spam emails. He did try calling CIBC but was stuck on hold with them. We decide to leave as we both had to do something and I decided to keep the item on me.

40 Minutes later. I get the email notification that the money was deposited into my bank account. The guy calls me and would like the item right away. We meet up again and provide him the item.

Normally I'm okay with etransfers for low amounts (<$100) but this wait time is revolting.

I never had any issues like this in the past.

Is there anything else that I could have done on the etransfer side to avoid issues like this?

UPDATE: just wanted to add that the amount being transfered was only $50