🏠💸Lenders can offer more 30-year mortgages starting Thursday – but they won’t be cheap

Extending a mortgage by five years will lower Canadians’ monthly housing costs by a few hundred dollars but cost them six figures in the long run.

For a 30-year mortgage, the monthly cost of the average home in Canada would fall to $3,477 per month, compared to $3,789 for the same home with a 25-year mortgage. However, the total cost would rise from $1,136,853 to $1,251,835, an increase of almost $115,000.

The promise made by the Liberals in the 2024 federal budget to offer Canadians 30-year mortgage amortizations will come into effect for first-time homebuyers on Thursday.

#housing
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Canadian-born Paul Whelan, U.S. journalist Evan Gershkovich released in Russia prisoner swap

Canadian-U.S. citizen Paul Whelan and Wall Street Journal reporter Evan Gershkovich have been released from a Russian prison in an international swap deal, U.S. President Joe Biden confirmed Thursday.

Turkey, which co-ordinated the exchange, said 10 people, including two children, had been moved to Russia, 13 to Germany and three to the United States. Also involved in the swap were Poland, Slovenia, Norway and Belarus.

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📈Data shows violent crime up since 2015

The volume and severity of police-reported crime has been on “an upward trend that began in 2015,” Statistics Canada said in a report released last week.

The violent crime severity index “remained virtually unchanged” last year, the statistics agency said, because there was a decline in more serious crimes such as homicide. However, there was nearly a seven per cent increase in violent crimes such as assault, robbery and extortion, Statistics Canada said.

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Wedding celebration in Vancouver

Welcome to Khalistan.

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City plans 'sprung structures' for up to 300 refugees, asylum seekers

The City of Ottawa is hoping for a quick response on its funding application for a newcomer reception centre, which it now says will include two tent-like structures capable of sheltering up to 300 people.

The city submitted a request to the federal government for $32.6 million to fund the facility, known as a "welcome and stabilizing centre."

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📉Canada plans to reduce temporary residents, cap future intake

Canada plans to reduce its temporary residents and set a cap on temporary immigration, Immigration Minister Marc Miller said on Thursday.

The government wants to reduce temporary residents to 5% of the total population over the next three years from 6.2% in 2023, Miller said. That would be a cut of about 20% from Canada's 2.5 million temporary residents in 2023.

#immigration
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🇨🇦🇺🇸 How a cross-border conspiracy to smuggle drugs into B.C. on a Jet Ski unravelled

A 67-year-old man who planned to use a Jet Ski to smuggle more than 180 kilograms of fentanyl and methamphetamine into Canada was convicted in a Seattle courtroom Friday, after beachcombers found the drugs stashed in several duffel bags along the Washington state coastline.

John Michael Sherwood was found guilty of conspiracy to distribute controlled substances, possession of controlled substances with intent to distribute, and conspiracy to commit international money laundering following a six-day trial.

#US #BritishColumbia
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Sajjan defends request to use soldiers as backdrop for Diljit Dosanjh concert

Of course he does, he thinks he lives in Khalistan.

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👶📉 Canada’s major cities are rapidly losing children, with Toronto leading the way

Since 2016, the number of children under the age of 10 as a proportion of the population has shrunk in every one of Canada’s six largest cities. Most of these major cities are losing children at a rate faster than Canada’s overall national decline.

The census metropolitan area of Toronto (which includes Toronto and the cities of Vaughan, Mississauga, Brampton, Markham, and six smaller communities) saw the greatest decrease in children under the age of 10 per 1,000 people, with a drop of nearly 11 children in that proportion in five years.

In 2016, Toronto had nearly the same children per 1,000 residents as Canada’s average of 120. The population then rapidly declined, making it and Vancouver the only major Canadian cities to fall below the national average.

From 2016 to 2021, Toronto shed a whopping 32,990 children. It and Montreal, which had a loss of 1,705, were the only major Canadian cities to experience a total decline in children.

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Liberals borrow 'weird' tactic from Democrats in latest attack on Pierre Poilievre

The Liberals are labelling federal Conservative Leader Pierre Poilievre “weird” in a new line of attack borrowed from the United States Democrats.

Several Liberal MPs, including one cabinet minister, have used the word to describe Poilievre on social media in recent days.

Stealing the worst ideas.

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❗️Toronto terror arrests raise questions about security screening

The federal government is declining to explain how a Toronto man was able to immigrate to Canada despite allegedly having taken part in ISIS violence overseas.

Ahmed Fouad Mostafa Eldidi, 62, has been charged with committing an aggravated assault for the Islamic State outside Canada in 2015.

The RCMP arrested Eldidi and his son Mostafa, 26, at a hotel north of Toronto as they were allegedly about to commit a terrorist attack for ISIS. Police seized a machete and axe at the scene.

Just look at how hard the terrorists are trying to help with reaching immigration goals.

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How about he takes his rupees back to India?

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💰Average Canadian household pays 43% of income on taxes— only 35.6% on basic necessities

In a recent report, the Fraser Institute revealed that the average Canadian family is spending 43 percent of its annual income on taxes and just 35.6 percent on basic necessities like food and shelter.

The independent economic think tank examined how the tax burden on Canadian families has shifted from 1961 to 2024. The tax bill has jumped by 2,705 percent, according to the report, which found that an average household earned an income of $109,235 and paid $46,988 in total taxes.

In 1961, 33.5 percent of a family income was reserved for taxes while 56.5 percent went to basic necessities.

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Alberta sees downward trend in opioid-related deaths

A downward trend in April’s opioid-related death numbers is leaving the Alberta government "cautiously optimistic."

The latest data provided by the province shows an additional 90 opioid-related deaths in Alberta in April, bringing the province’s total so far this year to 452. The number of deaths is 27 per cent lower than in March, which recorded 123 opioid-related deaths.

#Alberta
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📍Toronto

These days it's either Pride parades or marches for Palestine. And nothing in between.

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Conservatives call for hearings into how terror suspects came to Canada

The federal Conservatives say Canadians deserve answers about the immigration and security screening processes undertaken for a father and son the RCMP recently charged in connection to an alleged foiled Toronto terror plot.

On July 28, the RCMP arrested Fouad Mostafa Eldidi, 62, and Mostafa Eldidi, 26, in Richmond Hill, Ont. The two were "in the advanced stages of planning a serious, violent attack in Toronto."

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No wonder his wife left.

#Trudeau
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‘Don’t be pooping on the beach,’ Doug Ford says of Ontario town saga

Anyone heading Wasaga Beach shouldn’t be “pooping on the beach,” Premier Doug Ford says as the Ontario town fights back against what it says are misleading social media posts.

Those posts claim people are defecting in the sand at Wasaga Beach Provincial Park, and the town’s mayor says Wasaga Beach’s image is being “gravely harmed” by them.

“It’s a very popular beach,” Ford said at an unrelated press conference on Wednesday.

“They have no proof people are pooping in the park.”

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🏠Rent in Canada now averaging $2,201 per month, with some markets seeing big jumps

Rents are still rising in Canada but the year-over-year pace of growth has slowed, according to a new report.

The data from Rentals.ca and Urbanation says asking rents for all residential property types averaged $2,201 in July, up 5.9 per cent from last year.

Vancouver saw a roughly seven per cent decrease in July rents from last year to leave its average at $3,101 and Toronto had rents decline five per cent to $2,719.

Quebec City, on the other hand, had a 21 per cent increase to $1,657, Halifax had an 18 per cent increase to $2,373, and prairie cities like Saskatoon, Edmonton and Regina also saw double-digit gains.

#housing
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