Several factors are cooling Langley's furious residential building pace. For an explanation, look to the United States. The effect of the sub-prime mortgage crisis there, triggered by banks which lent copious sums of money to people unable to repay them, has "bled into Canada," MacKinnon said.
New rules set to come into effect in September will make it impossible for home buyers to take out mortgages with 40-year amortization terms, and will also abolish mortgages that require no down payment. Both are expected to negatively influence residential development.