By city
Infinite Banking in Ottawa
Ottawa has a concentration of defined benefit pensions found almost nowhere else in Canada. That single fact changes the analysis more than any local housing number, and it changes it in both directions.
The pension is the whole question here
Most Canadian households have no defined benefit pension. A large share of Ottawa households do, through the federal public service, the military, the RCMP or the National Capital's institutions. That changes this analysis more than anything else about the city, and it deserves to be dealt with first rather than mentioned at the end.
A defined benefit pension already provides what a great deal of financial planning is trying to manufacture: an indexed income that does not run out and does not depend on markets. If you have one, the retirement income argument for a participating policy is substantially weaker than the version you will read in American material, which assumes you have nothing of the kind. Anyone who presents this strategy to an Ottawa public servant without adjusting for that is selling a script written for a different country.
Where it still applies, and it does
Two things a defined benefit pension does not do. It does not provide capital you can reach during your working life, and depending on the plan it may provide a reduced survivor benefit or none at all in certain circumstances.
The first is the access question, and it is the honest one. A pension is not collateral. A public servant with strong income and a secure pension who needs capital for a renovation, a child's education or a business opportunity is in the same position as anyone else: apply to a lender, or deplete savings. That is the binary the book describes, and a mature participating policy addresses it without requiring an application.
The second is the survivor question, which is a matter of reading your own plan rather than taking a general answer. Survivor provisions vary by plan and by election, and some plans reduce the benefit substantially. If your plan leaves a gap, insurance is the ordinary tool for closing it, and that is an insurance conversation rather than a strategy conversation.
The Ontario rules that apply
Insurance in Ontario is supervised by the Financial Services Regulatory Authority of Ontario. A professional here holds the licence of a Life and Accident & Sickness Insurance Agent. Under the Financial Professionals Title Protection Act, nobody may use the title Financial Planner or Financial Advisor without an approved credential; a life licence alone qualifies for neither. The transition periods have both ended. You can check a claimed credential with FSRA and the licence in the public register, and both checks take minutes.
The Quebec side of the river
Ottawa is unusual in Canada: a substantial number of people who work here live in Gatineau, across a provincial boundary that matters. Insurance is regulated provincially. A resident of Quebec is served under AMF regulation by a conseiller en securite financiere, and Quebec's private law differs on points that affect this strategy directly, including the presumption that a designation naming a married spouse is irrevocable. If you live on the Quebec side, the Quebec rules apply to you regardless of where your office is. The Gatineau page covers that side in full.
Where it does not fit
A reader with a strong indexed pension, no dependants, no corporation and no capital need is a poor candidate, and the honest answer is that the strategy has little to offer them. So is anyone carrying high-interest consumer debt or without an emergency reserve. Cash surrender value is typically below cumulative premiums for many years, and a lapse with an accumulated gain is a taxable disposition.
Nothing on this page is advice. No assessment has been made of anyone reading it, and the author is not neutral: he is licensed to sell the contracts this strategy uses and is paid a commission when one is placed. If you have a federal pension, take your plan documents to an accountant before you take anything from this page. A predictable federal salary over a long career is exactly the stability this strategy needs, which is a real advantage and a rare one. The other side of that is that the usefulness question gets harder: someone whose retirement is already secure should be able to name what the capital is for, and if they cannot, the honest answer stays no.