Mortgage approvals rise to €13.2bn over last 12 months

There was almost €1.3bn in new residential mortgage loans approved in July that helped to bring the value of new mortgage business to €13.2bn in the past 12 months, suggesting a strong recovery from the Covid crisis, new figures from the banks show. 

The Banking and Payment Federation Ireland, the banking industry group, said that at 5,033, the number of new home loans in July was down by over 3% from June but up strongly, by over 48%, from July 2020, when the restrictions under the first wave of Covid were only ending.

"These are significant figures and very much signal a robust pipeline for drawdown activity later in the year,” the industry group it predicted.

It said that the €1.3bn in mortgages was "the most in any month" since the figures were collected by the industry group in 2011.

The latest figures mean that 53,511 residential mortgages were approved in the 12 months to the end of July. 

As in the past, first-time buyers accounted for over half of the new mortgage approvals.

“The latest mortgage approvals for July show continued growth, especially for FTB (first-time buyer) mortgages," said Brian Hayes, who heads up the banking industry group. 

"The value of approvals more than doubled since the 12 months ending October 2016, driven by growth in lending to FTBs and re-mortgages or switching,” Mr Hayes said.