Shift Income Calculator (what your pay qualifies you for)

Qualifying rate = the greater of your contract rate + 2% and 5.25% (the federal stress test). Housing costs are capped at 39% of gross income and all debts at 44% (the insured-standard GDS/TDS ceilings) — whichever binds first sets your payment room. Payments use Canadian semi-annual compounding. Down-payment rules: 5% of the first $500,000 and 10% of the balance, insured purchases cap at $1,499,999, and from $1,500,000 the file needs 20% down.

Under 20% down the mortgage must be insured. The premium is normally added to the mortgage (it can also be paid in one lump sum), and this page assumes it is: 2.80% of the mortgage when it is more than 80% and up to 85% of the price, 3.10% up to 90%, 4.00% up to 95% (CMHC’s standard rates; over 90%, a borrowed down payment costs more). The qualifying payment is worked on the mortgage including the premium, as CMHC requires. A 30-year insured amortization is only for first-time buyers and newly built homes, and adds 0.20% to the premium; everyone else is insured over 25 years. First-time buyer means you have never bought a home, have not lived in a home you or your spouse owned in the last four years, or recently went through the breakdown of a marriage or common-law relationship. With 20% or more down there is no premium and your own amortization applies. In Ontario, Quebec and Saskatchewan the premium also carries provincial sales tax, which can’t be added to the mortgage.

The engine behind this page passes 1,060 automated checks — every formula re-derived independently, a $500,000 canonical payment case computed two separate ways, a month-by-month payoff simulation that must die to under a cent, fully hand-computed qualifying cases the engine must match exactly, and a second, independently written method that must agree to the cent on every test case. Arithmetic last verified October 23, 2026. It’s an illustration built on public rules, not a quote or a commitment to lend.