BREAKING Security guard shot, seriously injured outside of Drake's Toronto mansion
A security guard working at Drake’s Bridle Path mansion in Toronto was seriously injured in a shooting outside the residence early Tuesday morning, police said.
As businesses reopen and social gatherings resume, some Canadians may notice they’re spending more now than they were during the peak of the pandemic.
During the first quarter of 2021, for example, Statistics Canada said the household savings rate went up to 13.1 per cent – more than double the rate of 5.1 per cent in the first quarter of 2020.
Even Canadians’ credit card debts have been dropping, with rates hitting a six-year low in June due to reduced spending, according to the consumer credit reporting agency Equifax.
“Across the board in all age groups, we’re starting to see people pay more than they actually spend on a credit card, which is a real positive behaviour change in terms of consumers,” Rebecca Oakes, assistant vice-president of advanced analytics at Equifax, told The Canadian Press in June.
Despite these positive signs, the temptation to spend more as society reopens can derail these newly adopted saving habits.
To avoid this, finance expert David Lester shared some tips on how Canadians can keep their budgets balanced as pandemic restrictions ease.
Lester advised Canadians to try to maintain that 13.1 per cent savings rate they achieved at the start of 2021.
“So we want to make sure that we fill up our emergency fund. You want to have six to nine months of expenses set up in there,” he told CTV’s Your Morning on Tuesday.
Next, Lester said they should talk to their financial adviser or accountant for advice on where they should put the rest of their savings.
“It could go into your TFSA or it could go into your RSP depending on your financial situation, but we should just get used to saving 10 to 15 per cent,” he said.
“In Australia, it’s law that you have to save 10 per cent and we should just pretend we’re Australians and make sure we save that 10 to 15 per cent every single year.”
During the lockdowns it was easy for Canadians to avoid using their credit cards because so many stores were closed, but now that businesses and activities are reopening, Lester said people should plan for their spending.
Lester said Canadians should pre-pay or put down what they’re planning to spend for the month on their credit card in advance.
“You’re going to keep your credit rate going up, you’re going to get the points, if there's any problems with the products, you always have the customer service with the credit card, but you won't be going into debt,” he said.
“You’ll be paying it first, just like a debit card would be, and then going to zero [balance].”
Lester recommended that Canadians sit down with their families and come up with a list of items or activities they didn’t really miss during the lockdowns in order to come up with a new budget for these post-restrictions times.
“Maybe it was travel, maybe it was movies, maybe it was having coffee at home, or not buying expensive clothing,” he said.
“So see what you really don’t miss and go back through that budget line-by-line and see what you don't have to add back on now that things are opening up. We don’t want to go back to that bad spending that we were doing before.”
Finally, Lester urged Canadians to continue to support local businesses that were hard-hit during the COVID-19 lockdowns, even as other larger businesses reopen.
“Make sure that you're always ordering the extra garlic bread when you are ordering a pizza or, you know, dyeing your hair or doing something else just to get more money into these small businesses and shops and salons that have been closed for almost a year now,” he said.
With files from The Canadian Press
A security guard working at Drake’s Bridle Path mansion in Toronto was seriously injured in a shooting outside the residence early Tuesday morning, police said.
Prince Harry will not be seeing his father King Charles during his current visit to Britain as the monarch will be too busy, Harry's spokesperson said on Tuesday.
Movement is movement, right? Not exactly. Here’s what your body is looking for in addition to your morning walk or yoga session, according to experts.
An Ontario man says he paid more than $7,700 for a luxury villa he found on a popular travel website -- but the listing was fake.
Sporting mullets, Canadian Armed Forces officer cadets placed second in an annual military skills competition in the U.S.
The Met Gala and its fashionista A-listers on Monday included Jennifer Lopez, Zendaya and a parade of others in a swirl of flora and fauna looks on a green-tinged carpet lined by live foliage.
Quebec is looking at tightening the regulations around sperm donation in the province following the release of a documentary that revealed three men from the same family fathered hundreds of children.
As the higher cost of living continues to squeeze household budgets, many Canadians find they have even less left over at the end of every month to squirrel away for the future.
The rumours are true: Vegetables aren't real — that is, in botany, anyway. While the term fruit is recognized botanically as anything that contains a seed or seeds, vegetable is actually a broad umbrella term.
Whether passionate about Poirot or hungry for Holmes, Winnipeg mystery obsessives have had a local haunt for over 30 years in which to search out their latest page-turners.
Eighty-two-year-old Susan Neufeldt and 90-year-old Ulrich Richter are no spring chickens, but their love blossomed over the weekend with their wedding at Pine View Manor just outside of Rosthern.
Alberta Ballet's double-bill production of 'Der Wolf' and 'The Rite of Spring' marks not only its final show of the season, but the last production for twin sisters Alexandra and Jennifer Gibson.
A mother goose and her goslings caused a bit of a traffic jam on a busy stretch of the Trans-Canada Highway near Vancouver Saturday.
A British Columbia mayor has been censured by city council – stripping him of his travel and lobbying budgets and removing him from city committees – for allegedly distributing a book that questions the history of Indigenous residential schools in Canada.
Three men in Quebec from the same family have fathered more than 600 children.
A group of SaskPower workers recently received special recognition at the legislature – for their efforts in repairing one of Saskatchewan's largest power plants after it was knocked offline for months following a serious flood last summer.
A police officer on Montreal's South Shore anonymously donated a kidney that wound up drastically changing the life of a schoolteacher living on dialysis.
Since 1932, Montreal's Henri Henri has been filled to the brim with every possible kind of hat, from newsboy caps to feathered fedoras.