Feeling eery about the Guelph and Wellington County real estate market? COVID-19 is making its impact on the market in many different ways. We have written this blog post to help you understand the different options you may have with your bank/lender during this time, explain why getting in touch with your team to help adapt you to this environment if you have purchased/sold is important, and why there are still real estate transactions happening today. Hopefully, we bring you clarity and share our market knowledge with you through this post.
Talk to your bank/lender to explore your options if you are considering purchasing or refinancing. If you are wondering about your options over the next weeks/months, there is a list of lender customer service numbers at the bottom of the blog post. If you qualify for a deferral in payments, things to verify may be what kind of costs are associated with this (interest costs and how your shorter-term financial situation will look once payments resume; whether your credit will be negatively affected, etc.) Each lender may have different solutions available; please give them a call if you would like to find out more information.
Get in touch with your lawyer, bank/lender, and/or anyone else who is part of your buyer’s team to make sure you will have a successful closing if you have purchased and are awaiting completion. Find out about, and align yourself with their means of transacting. You may be asked to download software or applications that you are not familiar with – many of these are consumer-friendly and easy to use. We have experience in a lot of these, so please don’t hesitate to reach out to us if you need us to walk you through using them or how to download them to your devices.
We are fully aware that real estate is still transacting. Some may wonder: but how? As well, some have questioned our necessity as an industry to continue to work. Well, people may have sold prior to COVID-19 and now must find a home to buy. Similarly, people have possibly purchased and now have a home to sell because they cannot carry two homes. While unfortunate, there are still family and life circumstances that arise, like divorce, death, unsuccessful business ventures, and the list continues. Some owners may know that they simply cannot afford their home without their incomes in the near future and are thus being proactive in selling, in order not to foreclose or be evicted under power-of-sale. More information on this topic here. Landlords may have renters not able to pay, thus cannot continue to carry their properties. While perhaps fewer, some may be speculating on future market conditions and transact based on information they perceive to be predictions of coming times. Regardless of the reason, properties are still transacting. One has to keep in mind that real estate transactions often involve a number of players, and additionally are a revenue source for the government (via those players, as well as simply through taxes). Something to chew on, but certainly matter-of-fact.
You can get in touch with us with any questions you may have – there is never a dumb question in real estate, especially given these uncertain times. No one can deem themselves an expert in this environment as no one has had the experience in navigating this type of circumstance before. We all are provided with new information every day and are all becoming very acclimatized to adapting. Feel free to email us at our team email “[email protected]” to set up a phone call, Facetime, Skype, Zoom meeting, or anything that works best for you. Currently, we are restricting our face-to-face meetings and showings with clients to reduce the impact of COVID-19. We are happy to tour homes on your behalf virtually and have the means and experience to deal with offers where a buyer has not yet seen the home physically. While rare, it did happen on occasion prior to this situation.
Stay well. From your trusted team.
Lender Customer Service Numbers:
ATB 1-800-332-8383
B2B 1-800-263-8349
BMO 1-877-895-3278
Bridgewater 1-866-243-4301
CIBC 1-800-465-2422
CMLS 1-888-995-2657
Optimum 1-866-441-3775
Equitable 1-888-334-3313
Connect First 403-736-4000
Chinook Financial 403-934-3358
First Calgary Financial 403-736-4000
First National 1-888-488-0794
Haventree 1-855-272-0051
Home Trust 1-855-270-3630
HSBC 1-888-310-4722
ICICI 1-888-424-2422
Manulife 1-877-765-2265
MCAP 1-800-265-2624
Merix 1-877-637-4911
Marathon 1-855-503-6060
RBC 1-866-809-5800
RFA 1-877-416-7873
RMG 1-866-809-5800
Scotia 1-800-472-6842
Servus 1-877-378-8728
Street Capital 1-866-683-8090
TD 1-866-222-3456