TD Canada Trust posts

Perhaps you haven't heard, but the government is tightening up the mortgage requirements. Finance Minister Jim Flaherty announced last week that mortgage rules are changing. The federal government is reducing the maximum amortization period from 30 years to 25 years unless you're able to put down 20 per cent.

The Bank of Canada's Mark Carney supported the government's actions and issued another warning that Canadians are living on borrowed money and need to rein in their debt from a staggering $1.52 for every dollar earned.

We're living in a debt-ridden society and part of that reason is that we don't really understand how debt works. This includes credit cards. A recent poll from TD Canada Trust found that younger Ontarians (Ontario being a have-not province) aren't quite that savvy with their cards and digging themselves into debt.

Canadian Small business owners aren't overly worried about lingering effects of the recession.
According to a new TD Canada Trust poll, 50 per cent of small business owners think 2012 will be a good business year and a further 13 per cent believe it might be the best yet.

"It's very encouraging to see the majority of small business owners are so optimistic about their business prospects in 2012," said Alec Morley, TD Canada Trust's senior vice-president of small business banking in a news release. "Sixty-five percent of Canadian small business owners gave their company's recent performance a B or above, so it's evident that many entrepreneurs are experiencing success despite the barriers in their way and this is due, in part, to good business planning, hiring talented teams and innovating."

The concerns include cash-flow worries and labour shortages. The 2011 TD CanadaTrust Small Business Survey examined the attitudes and behaviours of small business owners in Toronto, Montreal, Vancouverand Calgary. The results found two in 10 small business owners gave their company an A-plus (5%) or A (16%) for 2010 while 44% graded their business a B, 22% gave their businesses a C, and 11% gave their company a D.

Points are an obsession amongst budget-conscious travellers – how to get more and how to use them for the next trip. A recent survey by TD First Class Travel VISA found that 43 per cent of Canadians with travel reward cards have used their points for travel, with 80 per cent of those using it for airfare.

The downside is that the points generally only cover the base price of the tickets or taxes. Twenty per cent of those who responded to the TD survey said that we were unsure what their current credit card covers and would prefer their card cover trip cancellation insurance (56%), travel medical insurance (48%), car rental insurance (46%) and delayed baggage insurance (44%).