Number of mortgages falls 60% compared with 2008

THERE was a near60% drop in the number of mortgages granted in the Irish market last year, with just under 46,000 home loans issued against a figure of more than 110,300 in 2008.

In value terms, the aggregate value of issued mortgages in 2009 amounted to just over €8 billion. This was back in line with the €8.3bn lent to house buyers in 2007, but considerably down on the €23bn lent in 2008.

The new figures, published yesterday in the latest quarterly mortgage market profile jointly produced by the Irish Banking Federation (IBF) and PricewaterhouseCoopers (PwC), also showed the final quarter of last year saw an 18.4% year-on-year drop in mortgage volumes to 9,946, while average values of individual mortgages are now back to 2005 levels.