The Financial Consumer Agency of Canada is running a month-long public awareness campaign to help new homebuyers find unbiased mortgage information.

The federal crown corporation is running transit ads on Ottawa buses, Toronto buses and subway cars, and Vancouver buses and Skytrain cars.

Online, there are banner ads on several sites, including Metroland online newspapers, Chatelaine in English and French, Macleans, Canadian Living and the MochaSofa network.

Quiller & Blake’s Toronto office handled both the media buy and creative for the campaign.

The target demographic is first-time homebuyers and young families who are renewing their mortgages. The ads push people to the FCAC money management website, where visitors can find free and objective information on mortgages.

Toronto, Ottawa and Vancouver were chosen because FCAC research shows that 89% of all first-time homebuyers live in those cities, Julie Hauser, media relations officer, FCAC, tells MiC.

‘Our research also showed that a lot of our target audience are heavy commuters and users of mass transit, so this was a good way to reach them, whether they take public transit or even if they’re in vehicles and see the ads on the outside of buses,’ Hauser says. ‘For the internet portion, this age group is [made up of] heavy internet users, especially for banking, economics and local financial news, so this was a good way to reach them.’