First-time Buyers
Mortgage approvals drop in February
Mortgage approvals fell in February for the first time in 13 months dropping from 76,800 in January to just over 70,000, figures from the Bank of England lending trends has shown.
But despite the decline, February’s approvals were 34% higher than the same month a year before.
Mark Harris, chief executive of mortgage broker SPF Private Clients, said: “While transactions are much higher than a year ago across most of the country they are still below pre-recession levels so the recovery has some way to go.”
Approvals for remortgages followed a similar negative trend dropping from 35,700 approvals in January to 33,900.
But year-on-year remortgage approvals were up 20% from 28,300.
In February gross secured lending rose to £17.8bn which represented a 1.6% growth rate over the last three months.
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But product pricing remained largely unchanged. Two-year fixed rates have remained stable with some small uptick on five-year fixes.
Harris said: “‘Five-year fixes have started to edge up partly as a result of higher swap rates which have doubled in the past year.
“However there are still five-year deals pegged at around 3% for those with sizeable deposits which are excellent value.”