BoE: June mortgage approvals highest since 2008

The last time approvals were that high was in April 2008, when there were at £26.5bn.

BoE: June mortgage approvals highest since 2008

The value of mortgage approvals reached a nine-year high of £23.9bn in June 2017, Bank of England Statistics show.

The last time approvals were that high was in April 2008, when they stood at £26.5bn.

There were £14.5bn approvals for home purchase and £8.5bn for remortgage.

Jeremy Duncombe, director of Legal & General Mortgage Club, said: “Today’s results are indicative of how resilient the housing market is.

“However, what the figures do not show is that buyers arehaving to borrow larger sums of money as house prices continue to rise at a much higher rate than wage inflation.

“Put simply, house prices are making it extremely challenging for first time buyers to become home owners.

“To add to this, people already on the ladder are finding themselves stuck in their current homes due to the lack of supply, and the costs associated with moving.

“To redress these issues, the government needs to focus on building more housing across all types of tenure, as well as re-visiting whether levies such as stamp duty are stopping people moving.”

By transaction number the June housing market was busier than the proceeding two months with over 140,000 mortgages being approved.

In May there were around 132,900 approvals and in April there were 111,100, though in March there were 144,300.

Of the 140,000 77,800 were for house purchase and 47,600 were for remortgage.

Mark Harris, chief executive of mortgage broker SPF Private Clients, said: “Net secured lending ticked up a little in June although lender appetite is far stronger than these figures suggest.

“With little upward pressure on interest rates, lenders continue to reduce their fixed-rate mortgages. HSBC was the latest lender to cut rates at the end of last week, resulting in a five-year fix pegged at just 1.59%.

“We expect to see plenty of action on the remortgaging front as borrowers move to take advantage of some of the cheapest rates ever.”

Jeremy Leaf, north London estate agent and a former RICS residential chairman, expected figures to be even stronger.

He said: “Bearing in mind many people were probably more concerned with the outcome of the election, numbers could have been much lower and on the high street we are certainly not expecting the market to fall off a cliff anytime soon.

“From what has been happening in our offices, we don’t expect to see any great change in coming months other than a slight pick-up in September as prospective buyers and sellers return from holiday.”