Scotiabank, the '800-pound gorilla' of mortgage broker lenders, is making it more challenging to get its Scotia Total Equity Plan (STEP) readvanceable mortgage. And that leaves a product gap for both brokers and Scotia retail reps.

What a week for the real estate market. Another week like this, and your earnest author might have to hang up his keyboard and get a realty license.

Just fooling, of course, those lockboxes are too tricky. Nonetheless, before this week, many had been worrying about home prices breaking down, given that 75 bps of cuts didn't work as advertised. Fortunately, this week's developments (insurance loosening, sub-2% inflation and the Fed cut) are just what real estate doctors ordered. 

Watch what they do, not what they say.

That's the takeaway from Wednesday's Fed rate cut announcement. (Decision Details)

What came out of the Fed Chair's lips was:

Here's the latest on Monday's default insurance bombshell...

The good news keeps rolling in.

Let's start with Tuesday's CPI marvel. Defying virtually all expectations, inflation has ducked below the Bank of Canada's 2% target—roughly a year ahead of schedule.

And while the media and StatsCan were busy celebrating 2%, the actual figure was even better at 1.95%. (Official inflation readings are rounded.)

So, about that shelter inflation problem...

The federal government must have figured home prices weren't going up fast enough because the real estate fairy just left a trio of stimulative policy changes under home buyers' pillows.