Should you Buy a home now?

The market is cooling its heels after a brisk run in the past months. The inventory is there and the sellers are beating each other by lowering their asking price. Some sellers are desperate as they have another closing approaching for them. The mortgage rates are still low. Yes, under the current scenario I believe it is the right time to buy for a buyer with good credit, good job, and good down payment.

So, what you need to know to reap the benefit of fallen market?

The foremost is maintaining your credit score.  If you are really planning to buy a home, hold on to your car loan or any other consumer goods loan. This loan will immediately lower your affordability and put you in jeopardy of home purchase.

1. The next is to go for pre-approval. Though pre-approvals don't mean much, but it does one thing and that is hold on interest rate.  Rest all is conditional on this and that condition. So make sure you lock into a rate.  The benefit of pre-approval is that if the interest falls you get lower interest and if it goes higher, you are still at a lower rate. Sound good? Speak to your mortgage consultant and don't shy away.
2. The pre-approval does another great thing.  It tells you your affordability. Stick to that and you won't get into trouble.
3. Some sellers will settle for less if you can close early.  See if it is possible for you.

There are more to what can be written in this post. One must make a diligent decision to have them enjoy the home rather than getting into financial crisis.

Call me to discuss your home purchase today. I can be reached 24/7/365 at 416-232-9000 or you can drop me a line at paulsellsfaster@yahoo.com. You are encouraged to visit www.quicksellnbuy.com for many tools like mortgage calculation, affordabilty calculators and many new listings.

Happy Home buying!




Disclaimer: The information is provided as a research and information help.  Please use your best discretion when buying real estate. Though it is deemed to be reliable, no warranty of any kind is implied.

 

Top 10 Secondary Schools in Mississauga

Top 10 Secondary Schools

The following is the list of top 10 secondary schools in Mississauga as reported by the Fraser Institute. To see the list of TOP 10 Elementary Schools in Mississauga click here.

Order	Secondary School name/Address	Ranking out of 718	Fraser Institute Rating out of 10	Average House prices
1	Lorne Park Secondary School 1324 Lorne Park Rd, Mississauga, ON L5H3B1 Phone Number: 905-278-6177	31	8.5	$1.3 M (Low: $580,000)
2	Cawthra Park Secondary School 1305 Cawthra Rd, Mississauga, ON L5G4L1 Phone Number: 905-274-1271	43	8.3	$600,000 (Low: $400,000)
3	John Fraser Secondary School 2665 Erin Centre Blvd, Mississauga, ON L5M5H6 Phone Number: 905-858-5910	50	8.2	$1.2 M (Low: $700,000)
4	Glenforest Secondary School 3575 Fieldgate Dr, Mississauga, ON L4X2J6 Phone Number: 905-625-7731	74	7.9	$700,000 (Low: $500,000)
5	Gordon Graydon Memorial Secondary School 1490 Ogden Ave, Mississauga, ON L5E2H8 Phone Number: 905-274-2391	74	7.9	$500,000 (Low: $350,000)
6	Streetsville Secondary School 72 Joymar Dr, Mississauga, ON L5M1G3 Phone Number: 905-826-1195	112	7.6	$900,000 (Low: $500,000)
7	Stephen Lewis Secondary School 3675 Thomas Street, Mississauga, ON L5M7E6 Phone Number: 905-363-0289	129	7.5	$600,000 (Low: $400,000)
8	Rick Hansen Secondary School 1150 Dream Crest Road, Mississauga, ON L5V1N6 Phone Number: 905-567-4260	144	7.4	$550,000 (Low: $440,000)
9	Port Credit Secondary School 70 Mineola Rd E, Mississauga, ON L5G2E5 Phone Number: 905-278-3382	161	7.3	$900,000 (Low: $400,000)
10	The Woodlands Secondary School 3225 Erindale Station Rd, Mississauga, ON L5C1Y5 Phone Number: 905-279-0575	175	7.2	$480,000 (Low: $400,000)

Disclaimer: The information is believed to be correct. The article is provided just for the sake of research and information.  However, caution is advised and the reader is requested to make independent inquiry to his/her satisfaction.

Top 10 Elementary Schools in Mississauga, Ontario

After immigrating to Canada you must be thinking on what school would be good for your child. This is a very valid point even before you think of renting or buying a dwelling. Your selection of school will determine your living place.

Unfortunately most of the families don't have the right knowledge as to where to find the school rating.  There's a resource online called Fraser Institute Report card which can be accessed by clicking here. What this organization does is provide information on schools based on scoring out  of 10 and uses EQAO test results for Primary and Secondary grades. Though not exhaustive, this report card provides a fair estimate of the school ranking in the area you are planning to settle down in. After all one of criteria of your move to Canada could be best education for your child so that they become better individuals and perform to perfection in their lives.

I recently found this resource online and thought of sharing. Many of you might be aware of its existence but anyways our joint endeavour is to spread knowledge of resource that can transform lives of our young minds.

Ten top elementary schools in Mississauga
School Board: Peel District School Board

Order	School  Name/Address	Rating 2010-11 Out of 2695	Fraser Institute Rating Out of 10	Average home prices Freehold: Semi-Det, Detached,Att/Row/Town
1	Kenollie Public School 1376 Glenwood Dr,  Mississauga, ON L5G2X1 Phone Number: 905-278-8991	44	9.4	$1.2M (Lowest: $777,000)
2	Plum Tree Park Public School 6855 Tenth Line W, Mississauga, ON L5N5R2 Phone Number: 905-824-0155	155	8.5	$504,000 (Lowest: $388,000)
3	Floradale Public School 210 Paisley Blvd W, Mississauga, ON L5B2A4 Phone Number: 905-275-1090	281	8.1	$561,000 (Lowest: $350,000)
4	Sheridan Park Public School 2280 Perran Dr, Mississauga, ON L5K1M1 Phone Number: 905-822-2401	313	8.0	$660,000 (lowest: $465,000)
5	Forest Avenue Public School 20 Forest Ave, Mississauga, ON L5G1K7 Phone Number: 905-278-2472	349	7.9	$700,000 (Lowest: $330,000)
6	Tecumseh Public School 1480 Chriseden Dr, Mississauga, ON L5H1V4 Phone Number: 905-278-5594	429	7.7	$1.1M (Lowest: $750,000)
7	Mineola Public School 145 Windy Oaks Dr, Mississauga, ON L5G1Z4 Phone Number: 905-278-3144	559	7.4	$630,000 (Lowest: $430,000)
8	Ellengale Public School 3480 Ellengale Dr, Mississauga, ON L5C1Z7 Phone Number: 905-279-1555	559	7.4	$400,000 (Lowest: $330,000)
9	Sawmill Valley Public School 3625 Sawmill Valley Dr, Mississauga, ON L5L2Z5 Phone Number: 905-820-2500	710	7.1	$900,000 (Lowest: $550,000)
10	Settler's Green Public School 5800 Montevideo Rd, Mississauga, ON L5N2S1 Phone Number: 905-826-4947	710	7.1	$400,000 (Lowest: $280,000)



 Disclaimer: Information believed to be correct but no warranty is implied. This is extracted from Fraser Report Cards and MLS(R) data.

Should you want more information on these areas of Mississauga, please write your comment in response to this post. I will try to provide the best answers for that.

Paul Cheema

Happy Canada Day

Protecting your privacy

Guard your information

Information on you is very important for many things in live like buying a home, creating a good credit profile, hunting for jobs etc. There are people in this world who find an adventure in stealing such an information. This probably satisfies the detective in them or the need to know for ulterior motives. The information may be stole for many reason: Fun sake, Making prank calls, or any other ulterior motives. As per the data published by Canadian Anti-fraud centre and mass marketing fraud (ref.below) the loss in September 2011 was close to $3.275 Millions

Most of the people are unaware on how to make sure their privacy is kept under guard. The result; some unscurpulous elements take advantage of this ignorance. We are in an era of internet marketing and commerce, where we have to leave our information for the vendor or service provider to know that he is interacting with a live human being and not with a robotic program. When you are submitting information online, be careful to read the privacy regulations of the information seeking page and make sure you are not submitting your data to a spam site or a phising website. The spam site floods your mail inbox with all those silly messages from pharmacies, surveys, product informations, and much more while the phising websites are designed to steal your personal information to be used either for hacking your computer system, or operate your accounts for their own ulterior motives. This doesn't mean that you stay scared and obstruct your online business.  Use of a reputed internet monitoring program and anti-virus is a solution to such spam and phising websites.  I have been using a program that effectively removes all such online threats and I am enjoying all net commerce and share information online.

Apart from online privacy protection here are a few tips to keep your self safe:

Remove and damage sticker
with your information on it

1. Don't throw out any letter or envelope with your addess on it. Try shredding all such matter.
2. Don't discard used prescription containers without removing your information on the stickers. Remember, these stickers carry your patient ID/your date of birth and medication. These can be used for getting some fake cards/debits cards or unimaginable motives.
3. When you receive a call from an agency you never heard of before, be cautious. Don't disclose your vital information over the phone. If they say that they are calling from reputed companies like Rogers, Bell, Telus, or any other service provider you have an account with, ask for their associate number and telephone number. It is better to call them back so that you are sure you are speaking with a bonafide person or customer service representative.
4. Password protect your cellphone. A friend of mine suggested me that I change the contact for my home to something different so that if it goes in some bad hands they can't trace your home. some people use like Ghar or base or ground zero.  It could be any thing unidentifiable.  Also it is not wise to have your family members appear as contact with their relations like, Spouse, or better half, or my love etc. Please keep it indescript.
5. Faxing your credit card information to a service provider is better than emailing it or saying it over the phone.
6. Always check for encryption or make sure the server is secured when you divulge your information. The encryption and securd server scramble your information which is not readable in transit.

The list is endless and not exclusive in any sense.

Example telephonic spamming 

Someone calls you and pretends to be calling from a credit card company saying that a suspicious activity has taken place on your card. You are given all information and you have only to say yes or no to that question. This is how the convo goes on:

Caller: Hello sir, am I speaking with Mr. human being?
You: Yes
Caller: Do you remember having shopped within last 2 hours?
You: yes/no
Caller: <if yes> Did you shop for over $800? <if no> We suspect a fraudulent transaction has taken place sir.
You: Yes/no
Caller: To make sure you are not charged for this expense and that we do proper investigation let me verify a few things with you sir. Sir, my name is _________________ and my associate number is 123456 (whatever). Should you need to call me again or if the call drops you can call me at 123-456-7890. Your call will be recorded for quality purpose (to make it look authentic). Are you okay to go ahead now?
You: Yes, yes (eager to get out of this issue)
Caller: Is your name Mr. human being?
You:Yes
Caller: Do you have a visa with CIBC?
You: yes
Caller: Are the last four digits 9999? (Can be from stolen card statement from your mailbox)
You: yes
Caller: Expiry date: 01/13?
You: No it is 01/14
Caller: Thanks. That was intentional sir. Now to maker sure you have the card in your possession, can you read out the last three digits on the other side beside the magnetic strip?
You:123
Caller: Thank you sir. Your credentials have been verified and we will proceed with our investigation. You will soon hear from us. Good bye.

And that's when you see something purchased on your card for $900. As far as I know, no investigation is launched if the theft is less than $1,000 (sick)!


Hope this helps you understand how your innocence or ignorance could be taken advantage of. Therefore the keyword is: BEWARE! BEWARE! & BEWARE!

Important links:

1. Tougher Law targetting Identity Thefts
2. RCMP- Identity theft
3. Safely buy and sell homes
4. Statistics of Mass Marketing Frauds and Canadian Anti-Fraud Centre

For more information or discussion you can always call me or email me.

Thanks for your time.