TORONTO—The Canadian Imperial Bank of Commerce anticipates it will issue half as many new mortgages in the latter part of the year as it did in the same period of 2017 amid cooling in the real estate market.
The bank has noticed a slowdown in the housing market in the last few months, likely due to changes to mortgage underwriting guidelines, Christina Kramer, CIBC’s group head of personal and small business banking for Canada, said on May 23. Those changes include a new stress test for buyers who don’t need mortgage insurance, which has made it harder for some would-be homebuyers to qualify.
