If there’s one mortgage report worth reading each year, it’s this one. CAAMP’s Annual State of the Residential Mortgage Market in Canada survey is perennially packed with timely statistics and trends.

Here are some of the more notable ones…

The mortgage market:

• 5,400,000:  The number of homeowners with mortgages.
• $186 billion:  Total estimated new mortgage volume this year (down 14% from 2008).

Mortgage activity:

• 27%:  Percentage of mortgage holders that got a new mortgage, switched their mortgage, or refinanced in the past 12 months.
• 47%:  Ratio of people who got mortgages this year with an amortization over 25 years. (Last year the number was 50%.)
• 34%:  Share of new mortgages arranged by brokers (vs. 35% last year).
• 88%:  Number of people that stayed with their current lender when renewing or refinancing.  (Only 12% left! Many of these people lost money by choosing to sign their lender’s renewal letter. Remember, renewals are negotiable. Ask your lender for their best deal and then call a mortgage planner to compare.)
• 9%:  Percentage of Canadians “dissatisfied” with their present mortgage. (For the many who choose to blindly stay with their lender, ignorance is bliss.)

Homeowner equity:

• 48%:  The average loan-to-value of Canadian mortgages.
• $130,300:  The average mortgage balance in Canada.
• 80%:  The ratio of mortgage holders with over 20% equity. (This is a somewhat reassuring statistic for people who fear a bursting real estate bubble.)
• 1%:  Approximate percentage of Canadians mortgage holders whose home is worth less than their mortgage

Typical mortgage terms selected by Canadians:

• 62%:  Chose 4- or 5-year terms (56% chose 5-year terms)
• 11%:  Chose terms over 5 years
• 27%:  Chose terms less than 4 years

Type of rate:

• 68%:  Chose a fixed rate
• 27%:  Chose a variable rate
• 6%:  Chose a hybrid mortgage (part fixed / part variable)

Rate shopping:

• 1.91:  The number of quotes people get (on average) when shopping for a new mortgage
• 4.74%:  The average 5-year fixed mortgage rate over the past 12 months
• 1.23%:  The average 5-year fixed discount that banks offered over the past 12 months

Miscellaneous:

• 30%:  Ratio of mortgages funded by mortgage-backed securities (MBS). (This is a huge leap from 17% two years ago.)