Please suggest me a few mortgage payment calculators

[Jeffrey L Evans]

Hello guys, 

My wife is planning to take some money as a loan for buying a property. The property is located in Ontario (She is from CA). The catch is, there are a lot of rates and fees applied to mortgage services. And, it is quite difficult to calculate the interest rate and monthly payment we have to make. I am having a hard time even understanding the terms like CMHC. I remember using a mortgage payment calculator when we purchased a property in Toronto. But It was a very long time ago and, I don't know whether the same methods are used to calculate amortization etc now. Can someone please help me to understand how mortgages are calculated nowadays in Canada? What are the different rates and tabs when it comes to calculating amortization? Is mortgage calculated in a different way compared to mortgages that are taken for other purposes like an educational loan, personal loan etc? Thank you in advance. 

[Roy N.]

@Jeffrey L Evans

If you are purchasing property in Canada and financing it in Canada - particularly residential property - the calculator referenced above will be inaccurate as interest will be calculated differently (depending upon the financing).

Amortization is the period over which the financing spread - that concept remains the same.  However, amortization and loan terms do not correspond here in Canada as they frequently do in the U.S.A.   Most residential financing here is amortized over 25-years, while the term of any given loan will be 6-months to 10-years with 5-years and 3-years being the most common terms.   With the exception of variable-rate mortgage financing, Interest on residential real-estate  is compounded semi-annually.   An overview can be found here.

The CMHC web-site also has a mortgage calculator which will accommodate high-ratio, insured mortgages.

My recommendation is to learn the underlaying principals, be able to perform the calculations manually and develop your own spreadsheet.  This exercise will give you a deeper understanding of the relationships between the variables involved.