So if you are in the process of renewing your mortgage then here is my method that can save you money. I recommend that you do this yourself, but if you feel uncomfortable with negotiating then seek the services of an independent mortgage broker.

1. I suggest that you go with a variable rate mortgage. A variable rate will save you money, there has been lots of research to back this up and historically a variable rate has always outperformed a fixed mortgage. Read more about fixed vs variable mortgage on MoneySense.
2. Next find out what rates are available, there are web sites that have done all the work for you, I like the type that provides a list of current rates, with out selling you anything. Print out the list and highlight the low entries for the type of mortgage you want. There may be special lenders that you might not qualify for, so look for banks and credit unions in your area.
3. Next head into your current bank/mortgage lender a month or two before your current mortgage comes up for renewal. They will have sent a letter offering to renew your mortgage at their current posted rates. This is their first offer, it is time to make your initial counter offer.
4. Dream big. Ask for a fully open variable rate mortgage with the lowest discount from the rate list you printed and highlighted, which you should now also place on your account managers desk.  Once in 5 negotiations have I actually gotten my bank to take this offer.  A five year open variable mortgage at -0.75%, in the middle of the last recession I was paying 1.5% on my mortgage! The reason I open big is it starts the bank in the uncomfortable position of having to tell a client NO.
5. At this point I suggest withdrawing your request for open variable and ask for a closed variable at the same low rate you started with. If you are a reasonably good client of your bank, then they should match the rate you found.
6. If your bank still has not agreed to your offer then you have a few options to try. Remember to always keep calm and remain respectful as you lay out your arguments.
1. Sell the bank the your future self. The future you has large amounts of savings and investments – from a new job or an inheritance. The future you will need some place to keep all your savings and investments. Your bank likes the future you, so they are willing to give the present you a break to keep you around.
2. You can play hardball, threatening to take all your business, along with your mortgage, to a new institution. I only suggest doing this if you are actually going to follow through. This might get the bank to agree to mortgage rate demands in order to keep your other accounts.
3. If they are offering you a rate just above what you wanted, see if they are willing to throw in some extras to make up the difference. Refund bank fees, waive annual credit card fees or upgrade you, at no cost, to their VIP banking service. I have actually gotten more refunds then what I lost by a slightly higher rate.
7. At this point if your current lender still won’t agree to your demands then it is time to find a lender who will.  You already have a list of banks or credit unions to check out, some with better mortgage rates then you were offered. It is more work but a lower rate will save you money.
8. Final tip, stay away from any mortgage gimmicks. This includes low introductory rates, which won’t save you money in the long run.

I hope these work for you as well as they have for me. Put your results and other tips in the comments below.

I think it is time Elections Canada took over the debate setup.  There should be clear rules of inclusion.  For example if your party is receiving federal financing based on the results of the last election then you should be allowed in.  Or any other rule, but something that parties can aim for and not the arbitrary decision of a closed door meeting.

Let your displeasure be known.

So a little late but here are the 10 projects that received my JOSSA (Jamas Open Source Software Award) for 2010.

Firefox/Thunderbird – Mozilla – I have been a long time user of both Firefox and Thunderbird, both at home and the office. Looking forward to seeing what the next major revision will bring.

Lightning – Mozilla – OK another one to Mozilla but this project deserved its own special mention.  It has allowed me at work to continue to fight our IT department in moving to Outlook.  It still has some issues but with the ability to talk to exchange servers and Google calendars it is easy to overlook these.  Looking forward to the future of this project.

Tab Mix Plus – onemen and Gary Reyes – On a typical day I have 15+ tabs open in FireFox.  Managing these can get a little bit frustrating.  Thankfully the Tab Mix Plus has some helpful options to keep me sane.  For example, you can choose where a new tab will open, my favorite is beside the current tab I am working on, saves me having to go to the last tab and pull it back to where I wanted it.

WP-Stats-Dashboard – Dave Lighthart – Keep track of all your social media accounts tied to your website can be a lot of work.  Dave has created this great WordPress plugin to provide you with a list of quick stats for a very wide range of social media and other community sites (some I only found out about through the plugin).  It has been great to see the progress this plugin has made over the past year.

NextGEN Gallery – Alex Rabe – Most plugins for WordPress are fairly small, which tweak or add a small piece of functionality.  Then there are the plugins in the category that NextGEN Gallery are in, which are massive.  This plugin turns WordPress into a CMS for photos.  Uploading in batches, organizing into galleries and albums, slide shows, thumbnails and watermarking.  I have yet to think of a feature it is missing.

Google Analyticator – Ronald Heft – Google Analytics is a great tool for gathering information about visitors to your website. This plugin for WordPress makes adding the tracking code a snap.  Extra features include the ability to exclude logged in users, based on permission levels.  Also adds access to stats right in your admin dashboard.

Google XML Sitemaps – Arne Brachhold – Don’t let the name fool you, this plugin does XML sitemap submission for a wide range of search engines, all with a few clicks.  Submitting sitemaps is an important part of SEO for any site.  The fact this tool does it with so little effort is a great time saver.

All in One SEO Pack – Michael Torbert – SEO takes work, there is no silver bullet that will just do it for you.  This plugin however makes it very easy to correct some SEO issues on any WordPress website.  It can be used to change the home page title, description and key words.  It can also automatically rewrite page and post titles for you.  A great tool when getting people started on a new WordPress site.

Contact Form 7 – Takayuki Miyoshi – I tried many contact forms for WordPress until I found this one.  Clean simple interface, with no extra fluff features (like Ajax pop ups) that would randomly break.  You want your contact form to make it easy for visitors to your website to reach you, look no further then this plugin.

Notepad++ – Don Ho and Team – I do most of my programming in a cygwin or linux environment.  But every so often I have to do things on a Windows machine, which Notepad++ has made less painful. Quick and feature rich it makes a great C, C++, HTML and PHP editor.  Wish I could same the same thing for most other Windows programs.

Well that is it for this year.  I hope 2011 JOSSAs won’t be so late, but last minute ski trips can happen any time.  I encourage you to start your own JOSSA style award.  It isn’t a lot of money but it will hopefully make a developers day, which will make your year better.

It has been 10 years now since Ontario opened up the electricity and gas utilities to allow competition and to give consumers a choice in selecting who to purchase these items from.  Out of this has come a few great companies that are able to offer customers something different, for example Bullfrog Power’s 100% Green Electricity. To keep things in balance there has also been a flourish of less reputable companies.

I am not here to comment on whether locking in your electricity or gas rate is a good idea.  That comes down to personal choices about tolerating variability in prices vs predicting which way the market is moving, you are essentially making a bet in which the marketer has the advantage.

Instead what I want to highlight is the tactics these companies use to sign up new customers and the fact they have continued to do this sort of scamming for 10 years.  It all starts with a knock on the door.

Unsuspecting: Hello?

Marketeer: Hi I’m from Ontario Energy*?

* They tend to omit the full name of the company in order to make it sound more government like.

Marketeer: What I’m doing here today is to make sure that you are covered for _________**.

** When I purchased my first home it was making sure that the bill was switched correctly from the previous owner.  This past weekend it was to make sure I was ready for the cut over to time of day based billing for electricity.

Marketeer: So if you could just get me your latest electricity/gas bill I can check it for you. ***

*** This is when you should politely slam the door closed.

I hate this approach.  First off they aren’t there to check anything, they are there to sell you something.  If they at least were honest from the outset of the conversation I would have more respect for them.  This line seems to be in the training manual for all of them.

I had a marketeer once who refused to leave my house until he saw my bill. He gave some story about having to come back later if I didn’t.  I had to physically shuffle him out the door.

If you didn’t close the door and actually retrieved your bill then there are several options.

I have heard from several people that the marketeer just wrote down the account number and left. Several months latter they noticed their gas bill had a section saying the gas was from company X.  The Ontario Energy Board who has fined several of the companies has tried to stop this practice but I imagine there will be a few desperate people trying to hit quotas that will try it.

The other option is that the marketeer will break into a sales chat about how rates are about to sky rocket, along with a fancy graph showing historical trends with their estimation line added to show the future rocket based trajectory that prices will take.

I refuse to do any sort of business with companies that operate in this fashion.  Just Energy – was called Ontario Energy Savings Corp – will not be on my list of companies to give any business to after being approached 10 years ago and again this weekend with the same script.  I know based on the OEB consumer issues reports that they aren’t the only ones but I have dealt with them several times now.  Feel free to add your story in a comment below.

If you are thinking of signing up for a locked in prices do your homework.  One site that will allow quick comparisons of rates is Energy Shop, however make sure you understand the full details of each plan.