In Canada buyers have two options for buying a property, insured (minimum down payment) and conventional (minimum 20% down payment), I will explore both these below and provide context.

INSURED

The bank act in Canada requires default insurance on all mortgage transactions where the down payment is less than 20% of the accepted purchase price. The cost of insurance can be either paid in cash or capitalized and included in the mortgage balance.
There are three default insurance providers, links to their sites are below:

• Canada Mortgage and Housing Corporation (CMHC) https://www.cmhc-schl.gc.ca/
• Sagen https://www.sagen.ca/
• Canada Guarantee Mortgage Insurance Company https://www.canadaguaranty.ca/

Under insured guidelines, default insurance can only be provided on properties less than $1MM in value and minimum down payments are 5% on the first $500,000 of property value and 10% on any portion of the price exceeding $500,000 and less than $1,000,000. These mortgage transactions also have a maximum amortization or loan repayment period of 25 Years.

Mortgage qualifications are also based on the mortgage stress test. Stress Testing uses the greater of either the Benchmark Interest Rate set by the Bank of Canada, currently 5.25% or the lenders effective rate + a 2% premium. Once a borrower is qualified based on the stress test, the actual monthly mortgage payment will be based on the effective rate of the mortgage loan.

CONVENTIONAL

Conventional mortgages do not require the default insurance and the borrower can work directly with the lender. Transactions require a minimum 20% down payment and the maximum amortization or loan repayment can be currently extended to 30 years and the mortgage approval is also based on the mortgage stress test (as quoted above).