The home mortgage firm plummets 15.7% in March and the average interest rate is already close to 3%

The rise in rates and the increase in the price of the Euribor take the average interest rate of home mortgages to its highest level since 2017

The number of mortgages constituted on homes fell by 15.7% last March compared to the same month in 2022, to a total of 36,182 loans, according to data released this Friday by the National Institute of Statistics (INE).

With the year-on-year decline in March, the home mortgage firm has chained two months of negative rates after the 2% drop recorded in February.

The average amount of mortgages constituted on homes fell by 1.5% year-on-year in the third month of the year, to 142,663 euros, while the capital lent decreased by 17%, to 5,161.8 million euros.

By autonomous communities, those that registered the highest number of mortgages on homes in March were Andalucía (7,280), Cataluña (6,467) and Madrid (5,515).

Likewise, the regions in which more capital was lent for the constitution of home mortgages were Madrid (1,200.2 million euros), Catalonia (1,050.4 million) and Andalusia (879.5 million).

In only one community, Asturias, more home mortgages were signed last March than in the same month of 2022, with an advance of 0.8%. In the rest of the regions there were year-on-year decreases, especially in the Balearic Islands (-31%), Madrid (-23.7%) and Castilla-La Mancha (-22.1%).

MoM (March over February), home mortgages rose 0.8%, while principal borrowed rose 0.3%. In both cases, they are the smallest increases in a month of February since 2020.

In the first quarter of 2023, home mortgage loans have decreased by 5.6%, with a decrease in borrowed capital of 5.4% and an increase in average capital of 0.2%.

THE INTEREST RATE ON HOUSING LOANS SOARS

The average interest rate for all mortgage loans stood at 3.29% in March, its highest figure since January 2017, with an average term of 24 years.

In the case of housing, after the rate hikes adopted by the European Central Bank (ECB) and the increase in the price of the Euribor, the average interest rate in March was 2.99%, above the 1.80% of a year earlier and the highest since April 2017. The average term is 25 years.

36.1% of mortgages on homes were constituted last March at a variable rate, while 63.9% were signed at a fixed rate, almost 12 points less than in July 2022, when a maximum of 75.4%. The average interest rate at the beginning was 2.72% for variable-rate home mortgages and 3.15% in the case of fixed-rate mortgages.

The INE revised last month the statistical series of interest rates since January 2020 after launching a new procedure to validate the results of the initial average interest rate in the mortgages constituted.

THE TOTAL NUMBER OF MORTGAGED PROPERTIES DROPS 16.9%

According to data from the statistical agency, the number of mortgages on rural and urban properties (the latter include homes) fell 16.9% in March compared to the same month in 2022, to a total of 47,459 loans.

The capital of the mortgage loans granted fell by 11.5% in the third month of the year, to 7,787.3 million euros, while the average amount of the mortgages constituted on the total number of properties rose by 6.6% and added 164,087 euros.

THE MORTGAGES THAT CHANGE THE CONDITIONS LOWER

Last March, a total of 14,176 mortgages changed their conditions, a figure 14.7% lower than that of the same month of 2022.

Considering the type of change in the conditions, there were 11,399 novations (or modifications produced with the same financial institution), with an annual decrease of 16.4%.

The number of operations that changed entities (subrogations to the creditor) was 2,181, 8.1% less than in March 2022. In turn, in 596 mortgages the owner of the mortgaged asset changed (subrogations to the debtor), a 3 .1% less than a year before.

Of the 14,176 mortgages with changes in their conditions, 32.1% are due to changes in interest rates. After the change in conditions, the percentage of fixed interest mortgages increased from 13% to 40.2%, while that of variable interest mortgages decreased from 85.6% to 58%.

The Euribor is the rate to which the highest percentage of variable-rate mortgages refer, both before the change (81%) and after (54.8%).

After the modification of conditions, the average interest on loans on variable-rate mortgages rose one tenth, the same as that of fixed-rate mortgages.