Mortgage approvals up in January

IveSeenTheLight

Mortgage approvals up in January


The number of mortgages approved rose last month


The number of mortgage approvals in the UK made by banks rose slightly in January, industry figures have shown.
Mortgage approval levels hit 23,376 last month, up 4% from 22,416 in December, the British Bankers' Association (BBA) said.
However, the number of approvals in January was still 43% lower than the same month a year earlier.
The total net value of mortgage lending last month was £2.9bn, down from £3.3bn in December.
This figure strips out redemptions and repayments, and so gives a clear picture of new mortgage lending by the High Street banks.
Housing slump
The latest figures from the BBA come after a number of reports have indicated the extent of the housing downturn.
The High Street banks' mortgage lending is still seeing double-digit annual growth, albeit in a much slower market


David Dooks, BBA statistics director


Last week, the Council of Mortgage Lenders said the number of UK homes repossessed in 2008 rose by 54% to 40,000.
Meanwhile the Land Registry - widely seen as the most authoritative guide to the market - said house prices in England and Wales fell by 13.5% in 2008.
Prices also continued to fall in January according to both the Royal Institution of Chartered Surveyors (Rics) and the Nationwide, although the Halifax said property values rose slightly in January.
Upbeat
However, the BBA's statistics director David Dooks offered an upbeat assessment of the latest lending figures, pointing to the annual growth in net mortgage lending of 10%.
AREAS OF INCREASED LENDING
Manufacturing: up £400m
Wholesale and retail trade: up £300m
Transport, storage and communication: up £100m
Real estate: up £1.1bn
Renting machinery and equipment: up £100m
Electricity, gas and water: up £400m

Source: British Bankers' Association

"The High Street banks' mortgage lending is still seeing double-digit annual growth, albeit in a much slower market," he said.
"Lower borrowing costs and falling property prices have underpinned demand at these lenders, who are providing over two-thirds of all new mortgage lending."
The figures showed that the number of mortgages approved for those who are remortgaging rose slightly to 30,710 in January, from 30,500 in December.
With interest rates at such a low level, many people who reached the end of their fixed-rate deals stayed on the standard variable rate to which their repayments automatically reverted. When the rate was higher they were more likely to seek a new fixed-rate deal.
Another effect of the low Bank Rate was a £2.2bn fall in personal deposits in January. The BBA suggested that this was due to people moving their savings from ordinary savings accounts to alternative assets which offered bigger returns.
Meanwhile, many small firms have been vociferous about the lack of lending from banks in recent months. They said this had put extra pressure on viable businesses during the recession. But the BBA said that lending to non-financial companies by the High Street banks increased by £1.9bn in January, after falling during the previous two months. Lending increased the most to the real estate sector, but fell to the construction industry, the figures showed.


http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/business/7907275.stm

IveSeenTheLight

Also interesting: -


£111,000: Average new mortgage for house purchase
£46,500: Average income of new mortgage holders
26%: Average deposit
14.4%: Average interest payment as proportion of income

Source: CML November figures

http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/business/7711689.stm

neas

Oh my god,

CRASH CANCELLED, CRASH CANCELLLED!!

not

chucky

i think that makes it a 4-month high

housesitter

Isn't Decemeber supposed to be the worst month for selling a house?
Adjusted for number of sales per average month, surely this is actually a drop!?

skap7309

The interesting point is the average deposit put down. 26% is quite alot.

chucky

skap7309 wrote: »

The interesting point is the average deposit put down. 26% is quite alot.

why? i expected that to be the way forward with the majority of loans being around this deposit amount.

and then only high credit score people would be able to get 90%.

ad44downey

IveSeenTheLight wrote: »

However, the number of approvals in January was still 43% lower than the same month a year earlier.

This is the salient bit.

It's good to see that less people are willing to get themselves into shedloads of debt just so they can get a grossly overpriced pile of bricks

IveSeenTheLight

ad44downey wrote: »

This is the salient bit.

It's good to see that less people are willing to get themselves into shedloads of debt just so they can get a grossly overpriced pile of bricks

What if next month there are more approvals and the next and the next?
It's quite possible that for the next year, the approvals are still lower than they were a year previously, however if each month they increase you could find the market has changed and your looking back at the bottom

neil324

IveSeenTheLight wrote: »

What if next month there are more approvals and the next and the next?
It's quite possible that for the next year, the approvals are still lower than they were a year previously, however if each month they increase you could find the market has changed and your looking back at the bottom

Yeh 25% HPI bye this time next year...........:j

ad9898_3

IveSeenTheLight wrote: »

Also interesting: -


£111,000: Average new mortgage for house purchase
£46,500: Average income of new mortgage holders
26%: Average deposit
14.4%: Average interest payment as proportion of income

Source: CML November figures

http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/business/7711689.stm

An interesting pie chart, (I like pies and charts.:D), although it would be interesting to see how many FTB'rs are out there, and what the figures you have quoted would be for them. Much less I would imagine, especially that income figure, huge swathes of the country are nowhere near that, (would be interesting to see if you take out London/SE).

I've sold and bought 3 times in the past, and the chains for each were in between 5-7 long, with one FTB'r at the bottom of each one (or probably a BTL'r between 2004-07).