There were just 32,000 loans approved for house buyers in January. The number of loans for first-time buyers fell by 54% in January to 11,300.
The CML’s figures confirm the picture portrayed by the latest figures on the property market.
In recent weeks:
• the CML said the gross value of all mortgage loans had fallen by 32% from December to January
• HM Revenue & Customs reported that the number of completed home sales in the UK had more than halved to 51,000 in January
• the Bank of England said that the number of home loans approved for house purchases in January, but not yet lent, had fallen by 17% to 48,198 – the lowest for eight months
• both the Halifax and the Nationwide mortgage lenders reported that prices had fallen in February, by 1.5% and 1% respectively.
Another survey, from Acadametrics, suggested that the effect of the slump in lending would last for longer than just one month.
The number of homes sold in England and Wales at the start of 2010 fell back to levels seen at the depths of the downturn it said.
Transaction levels fell to 36,000 in January, a drop of 52% compared with the previous month, and then only crept up to an estimated 40,000 in February.
However, it calculated that prices rose by 1.9% in February compared with January.
