Banks' mortgage approvals dip

FRESH evidence of a rapidly slowing housing market emerged today from figures showing mortgage demand has slumped to its lowest for eight months.

The British Bankers' Association said there were just under 60,000 mortgage approvals in September, a 6% decline on August and 29% lower than a year ago. At £6.7bn, the total value was also the lowest since January.

The figures come a week after the Building Societies Association said mortgage approvals by its members had fallen to their lowest for three years.

BBA director of statistics David Dooks said: 'Approvals for house purchase continued to slow, so consequently it would seem likely that underlying net mortgage lending will continue to be relatively weaker in the next few months.

Approvals are a key guide to the direction of the market.

Meanwhile, Abbey National, Britain's second-largest mortgage bank, saw its third-quarter net mortgage lending more than halve to £400m from £1.1bn at the end of June, as borrowers took their business elsewhere after the expiry of two-year lock-ins on discounted mortgages.

The bank's share of net mortgage lending fell to 4.4% in the three months to the end of September compared with 6.1% in its second quarter, a performance chief operating officer Stephen Hester called 'disappointing'.

Gross mortgage lending moved ahead marginally by £100m to £6.4bn.

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