Banks generally don’t like to offer mortgages on vacant land, only on a building plus 5 acres.  
There are some exceptions to this rule, but not many.  

We can assist with referrals to a mortgage broker, but note we have no assocation with any particular broker, and will just furnish a few names of people we know to be operating in our area.  

Note that the big institutional lenders typically have posted rates that are significantly higher than what they will accept. It pays to haggle!

The following is advice from the Bank of Canada on how to get the best mortgage rate. Noe that the big lenders typically have

Getting the Best Mortgage Rate

What’s the trick to a better mortgage rate? That’s what folks at the Bank of Canada wanted to know.
It led them to undertake an extensive study of mortgage discounting and below are its conclusions.

All quotes that follow originate from the paper’s authors: Jason Allen, Robert Clark and Jean-François Houde.
According to their research, the Canadians who get the best mortgage rates are those who:

1. Bargain

  • banks give better deals to skilled negotiators and well-informed borrowers, and stick it to people who don’t watch out for themselves.

2. Have larger mortgages

  • “…since few people negotiate the renewal of their mortgage…(this) provides lenders with an incentive to attract consumers with larger loans who have large outstanding balances at the time of renewal.”

3. Use a broker

  • The report states that brokers lower the “search costs” of getting multiple quotes. Multiple quotes are strongly correlated with lower rates.

  • “Over the full sample the average impact of a mortgage broker is to reduce rates by 17.5 basis points.”  That’s ~$1,670 of interest savings on a typical $200,000 mortgage over five years.

  • Bank “mortgage specialists offer convenience to consumers, although they do not reduce search costs. This is because they work for one lender only.”

4. Do significant non-mortgage business with a lender.

  • “Branch managers have an incentive to offer larger discounts to consumers…that are, or will be, more profitable to the bank.”

5. Have more equity

  • Those who put the minimum down (e.g., 5%) “pay higher rates than other borrowers—about 12 basis points more” than those with loan-to-value ratios below 85%.

6. Are new clients

  • “…new clients receive larger discounts than existing clients, on the order of 10 basis points.”

  • The authors state that research by Oxford professor, Paul Klemperer, suggests that “consumer switching costs” (i.e., the time, uncertainty and expense of changing lenders) provide banks with “market power” over existing customers.

7. Use smaller lenders

  • “We conclude that the larger a bank’s market share, the higher are the rates that it can charge to borrowers.”

  • “…Borrowers who are new clients at one of the Big 8 banks receive less of a discount than borrowers who are new clients elsewhere.”

8. Are financially capable

  • “…poorer borrowers may face greater levels of price discrimination when bargaining in person at the branch than they do when transacting through a broker.”

9. Have better credit

  • “Financial institutions…offer better rates to high credit score consumers.”

There are, of course, other factors that impact one’s mortgage rate. Moreover, there are exceptions to the findings above. As one example, not all bank reps are uncompetitive. "We know some excellent mortgage specialists that are highly competitive—meaning they’re within 10 basis points of the best industry rate most of the time." (Mind you, as this Bank of Canada report concludes, that is not typical.)

If you’d like to read more, the full study is called: Discounting in Mortgage Markets.  Look for it on the Bank of Canada’s website.