Region served
With high debts, what counts is your ratios once the debts are paid off. How a lender recalculates them on a Capitale-Nationale file.
It all comes down to your ratios once the debts are paid off, not today’s. A tax debt weighs more than a credit card: Revenu Québec and the CRA can register a claim on the property, and most lenders require it to be paid out of the refinancing.
A list of your debts with exact balances and payments, your latest mortgage statements, your notices of assessment. If a tax debt is involved, ask for the official statement of account, the only figure the lender will work from.
A bankruptcy, proposal, judgment or collection doesn’t shut the door for good. Lenders look at how long ago it was discharged and what you’ve rebuilt since. That’s true in Capitale-Nationale and everywhere else in Quebec.
Lenders go by what they can verify themselves: several months of on-time payments, balances going down, credit used without going over the limit. An explanation that leaves no trace on the report doesn’t carry much weight.
Yes, alternative lenders charge more than banks. Ask what you’re buying with that extra cost. Time to rebuild your credit, or a bridge back to a regular rate? A clear way out counts for more than the rate itself.
A temporary solution is temporary only if the way out is written down: what has to change, by when, and what going back to regular financing will cost. Otherwise the stopgap becomes the arrangement.
To prepare
Yes. It all runs by phone, email or video call, and documents go through online. We can meet in person, but most files get settled without anyone having to travel.
Often yes, but not always with your cash. Paying down a card improves your ratios. Emptying your account to do it weakens the down payment. You have to run both numbers at the same time.
Pick the situation closest to yours.
Contact
Buying, renewing, refinancing, or something a bit out of the ordinary: tell us where you’re at, even if it’s still fuzzy. Mathieu gets back to you with next steps and the documents to pull together.