Lending On Homeowner Loans Increases In February
It has been a fairly volatile few months for the housing and home owner loan industry, with factors such as the end of the stamp duty holiday in December and the particularly bad weather in January, affecting the number of loan applications dramatically.
The latest figures form the Council of Mortgage Lenders (CML) has shown that there was an increase of 6 per cent in new lending on home owner loans and mortgages over the course of February this year.
Although the figure for the month is higher than would normally be expected, the CML say that they are not surprised by the increase, as this goes some way to compensating for the particularly poor new loan figures for January, which were much lower that would normally be expected due to the adverse weather conditions.
New lending on home owner loans stood at £8.7 billion for the month of January, but this had increased to £9.2 billion in February. Despite this increase, on an annual basis, new loans are still down by around six per cent on twelve months ago.
The CML have predicted a total lending figure of around £150 billion for the whole of 2010 and despite these early fluctuations in figures, they still stand by their original predictions.
Paul Samter of the CML commented on the figures, he said “As we look forward, we expect emerging signs of improvement as confidence in the economy grows and we move past the election. However, the need for the authorities to address fiscal deficit will inevitably slow the economy.”
“At the same time the funding markets, while certainly better than a year ago, remain difficult and will limit the flow of available housing finance. Given the short term weakness and distortions in the housing market, as well as more properties coming on to the market, it was perhaps unsurprising to see falls in some of the monthly house price indices in February.”
