Canadian Mortgage Calculators

In the midst of creating a bunch of Excel templates for mortgages and loans, I found out that Canadian mortgage calculations are different than in the US. So, I created a spreadsheet specifically for Canada mortgages.

One of the main differences is that a given mortgage rate is assumed to be compounded semi-annually. US mortgages are usually compounded monthly. I have verified the spreadsheet with a number of online Canadian mortgage calculators, and it checks out. But, I must admit, it is easy to get confused about "annual interest rates" and "effective annual interest rates" and "APR" and all of that.

It turns out that this calculator is much more general now (it can be used for both Canadian and US mortgage calculations). One of the things it doesn't do exactly is "accelerated bi-weekly" payments, but you can estimate this by choose the monthly option, and making monthly prepayments equal to the monthly payment divided by 12.

One of the nice things about making and using calculators in Excel (as opposed to online calculators) is that you can see exactly what the formulas are. So if you are just curious, or want to make sure that the calculations are correct, go ahead and check them out.