I posted this as a comment originally, but since they seem to have deleted the comment, I will put it here
Rather than maintaining vital credit standards such as requiring a down payment of 20 percent when purchasing a home (as Canada did, thereby escaping a financial crisis), mortgages were underwritten with as little as 3 percent down
As a Canadian, who put down 5% on his first mortgage, I think you may want to check your research.: http://lmgtfy.com/?q=canada+minimum+down+payment+mortgage
Canada has not required more than 5% since about 1946 (National Housing Act) when the government offered a pre-emptive bailout to the banks for the other 15%. This policy was put in place to increase the percentage of home ownership.
https://www.cmhc-schl.gc.ca/en/corp/about/hi/index.cfm
Since I've had a little more time to think about it, I will add some comments regarding Canada escaping a financial crisis: our banks failed and were bailed out.
http://business.financialpost.com/news/fp-street/did-canadian-banks-receive-a-secret-bailout
Some quick googling of numbers leads to a disturbing result (in billions):
US bailout: $700 of $14,700 GDP ~= 5% of GDP
CA bailout: $114 of $1543 GDP ~= 7% of GDP
Canada's bailout was significantly larger than the US bailout program. This may partially account for the 11% decline in GDP in Canada compared to the US decline of 2% (2009).
