Yes, in most cases you do need to pay a penalty. The penalty is different for each bank. The usual scenario is when a ban would charge you 3 month mortgage interest which is about $1000 for every 100,000 borrowed. So if your mortgage is 400,000 you would be paying close to 4000$ in penalty to break the mortgage. If you sold your house and planing to buy another one, you should talk to you bank to see if they will be able to move the mortgage to another property which is called "porting". If the mortgage you require is bigger you can reapply to get a higher mortgage and could have a blend mortgage where your additional amount has a different rate then the original mortgage.