loanmoose.ca is not a lender and does not make credit decisions. It does not fund mortgages, set rates or approve files. It is a matching and comparison service that shows you lenders whose published criteria line up with the situation you describe.
What a pre-approval commits a lender to
A pre-approval starts with an application and a credit check. From the income, debts, down payment and credit history you present, the lender calculates an estimate of how much it would be willing to lend and at what rate. That is the genuinely useful part: it turns a vague idea about a house budget into a working number, and it usually freezes a rate so your payment estimate stops moving while you shop for a property.
The limits matter more than the number. A pre-approval is conditional in almost every respect. It assumes your income will be verified, your down payment will be sourced and documented, your credit file will stay roughly as it was, the property will appraise at or above the price you agreed to pay, and the title will be clear. Each of those is a condition the lender can require and re-test. If one falls short, the lender can lower the amount, change the rate, add a condition, or decline the file entirely. A pre-approval is not a mortgage, and it is not a promise that a mortgage will follow.
Nor is it a verdict on you. Because lending in Canada is licensed provincially, the regulator and the rules differ depending on where a lender is registered and what kind of lender it is, so different institutions looking at the same application can reach different conclusions without either of them being wrong.
The Financial Consumer Agency of Canada describes how the mortgage process works from the consumer side, including the information a lender must give you about cost and terms, at Financial Consumer Agency of Canada — mortgages. Reading it before you sign anything is a reasonable habit.
How a rate hold works
A rate hold is the part of a pre-approval people value most, and the part most often misunderstood. There is no national standard length. The expiry date is set by the individual lender and written into your pre-approval document, so the date on your paperwork is the one that applies to you. A different lender may use a different window, and the same lender may offer different windows on different products.
Within that window the lender holds a rate. What that means in practice depends on the lender. Some hold a discounted rate, some hold a posted rate with a discount applied later, and some let you take a lower rate if the lender's own pricing falls before you close, but not a higher one. Ask directly, and ask for the answers in writing:
- What exactly is being held — the rate, the discount, or both?
- What is the expiry date, and what happens if you have not bought by then?
- Will the lender extend the hold, and does an extension keep the same rate?
- If the lender's rates fall before closing, does the better rate apply to you?
- Does the hold cover the property type you are actually buying, such as a house, a condo or a newly built home?
- What conditions still have to be satisfied for the hold to be honoured?
One technical point is worth knowing when you compare rates. Canadian fixed-rate mortgages are compounded semi-annually by law, which is why a mortgage rate does not behave exactly like a loan advertised with monthly compounding. The Bank of Canada publishes the policy interest rate, the prime rate, conventional mortgage rates and Government of Canada benchmark bond yields. Those are benchmarks, not offers, and no lender is obliged to lend at any of them.
| Element | What the pre-approval sets out | What the lender still verifies |
|---|---|---|
| Rate | A rate or discount held to an expiry date the lender chooses | That the product, property and file still qualify for it |
| Amount | An estimate built from the figures you supplied | Income, employment, debts, down payment source and credit history, all re-checked |
| Property | Usually nothing; a pre-approval can be issued before you have an accepted offer | An appraisal, clear title, zoning, and for condos, the building's documents |
| Conditions | A list of items that must be satisfied before funding | That each condition is actually met, in the form the lender requires |
| Commitment | An estimate, not a contract to lend | The lender decides at the commitment stage and again before advancing funds |
How much of a house loan do I qualify for?
That figure comes out of underwriting, and it is the reason house loan approval is never one national number. At federally regulated lenders, the amount is tested against a qualifying rate rather than the rate on your contract. Under OSFI's Guideline B-20, an uninsured mortgage is qualified at the greater of the contract rate plus 2 percentage points and 5.25%. Federally regulated mortgage lenders also generally work to a total debt service ratio ceiling of about 44%. Together, those rules mean the lender measures your payments at a higher rate than the one you will actually pay, so the amount you qualify for is lower than a simple payment calculation would suggest.
What decides the rest:
- Income and how it is documented. Salaried income is straightforward. Self-employment, contract work, bonuses, commissions and overtime are handled differently by different lenders, and the figure they average can be lower than your best year.
- Existing debt payments. Card minimums, car loans, student loans, lines of credit and support obligations all count against your ratios.
- Down payment. The amount matters, and so does where it came from. Borrowed funds and gifts usually need a paper trail.
- Credit history. Payment history, balances relative to limits, and how recent any problems are.
- The property. Location, type and whether the lender considers it easy to sell.
If you plan to add a home equity line of credit, note that at federally regulated lenders a HELOC is generally limited to 65% of appraised property value, with total secured lending usually capped at 80%. That ceiling sits alongside your mortgage qualification, not outside it.
What can still change the file before closing
Between pre-approval and funding, the lender re-verifies. These are the changes that most often move a file:
- Employment or income change. A new job, a move to contract or commission work, a layoff or a probationary period can all require a fresh review.
- New debt. A car loan, financed furniture, a raised credit limit or a shifted balance changes your ratios even when the payment feels small.
- Credit file movement. Late payments, a collection or a cluster of new inquiries can change how your file scores. Canada has two national credit reporting bureaus, Equifax Canada and TransUnion Canada, and a lender may pull either.
- Down payment problems. Funds that cannot be traced, an undocumented gift, or money that arrived as a loan.
- An appraisal below the purchase price. The lender lends against the property's value, not the price you agreed to pay.
- Property issues. Title problems, unpermitted work, zoning or condo document concerns.
- Expired conditions. A document that was fine at pre-approval can be too old at closing.
Checks to run before and after you get a pre-approval
- Ask for the pre-approval in writing, including the rate, the expiry date and the conditions.
- Confirm what the rate hold covers, and what happens if the lender's pricing improves.
- Ask what the lender will still verify, and gather those documents now rather than later.
- Keep employment and income as stable as you reasonably can until the mortgage is advanced.
- Avoid new credit, new financing and large balance transfers before closing.
- Tell the lender immediately if anything material changes, including a job move, a new debt or a change to the down payment.
- Before you waive your financing condition, confirm in writing that the file has moved to a commitment.
- Re-check the rate against current pricing before closing, and ask whether your lender will match its own current offer.
If your credit history is the obstacle
Some credit events carry known timelines. A consumer proposal stays on a credit report for 3 years after completion, or 6 years from filing, whichever comes first. A first bankruptcy stays on a credit report for 6 years after discharge. Only a licensed insolvency trustee can administer a consumer proposal or a bankruptcy. Those timelines describe the credit report, not a lending decision — a lender still weighs the rest of the file and reaches its own conclusion.
If something goes wrong with the lender
Complaints about federally regulated financial institutions go to the Financial Consumer Agency of Canada. Provinces license and supervise most other lenders, so for those the provincial regulator is the route. Knowing which one applies to your lender before you need it saves time later.
What to take away
A pre-approval is a working estimate and a rate hold, nothing more. The lender keeps the right to re-check everything, and it will. The lowest rates are only available to the most qualified applicants. That does not mean a pre approved loan is out of reach for everyone else — it means the file has to be strong on income, debt, credit and down payment at the same time, and it has to stay that way until the mortgage is advanced. What to do with your own numbers depends on your circumstances, and for a decision this size it is worth getting advice from a regulated professional who can review the whole file.