Full steam ahead at Nationwide as chief issues warning on housing market May 28, 2014 Nationwide has reported its best ever annual results, but has warned that the housing market may well start seeing a “natural correction”. “At some point buyers just start saying no”, said the mutual's chief executive, Graham Beale, to the BBC’s business editor Kamal Ahmed. The prognosis came as Nationwide reported that it opened 430,000 new [...]
RBS to cut 400 staff at US arm May 27, 2014 RBS PLANS to cut two-thirds of its mortgage trading staff in its US investment banking arm over the next 18 months as it cuts down its non-UK retail banking operations, the bank has confirmed. Around 400 staff will get the chop, though workers trading in rates, currencies, and credit will be unaffected. The bank also [...]
April regulation clips lending to housing market May 27, 2014 THE NUMBER of mortgage approvals for house purchases in the UK fell for a third month in April, despite the overall recovery of the housing market during the last year. There were 42,200 mortgages approved last month, according to the British Bankers’ Association (BBA). The figure is down from 45,000 in March, and has fallen by [...]
Letters to the Editor – 27/05 – Dangerous rates, China’s rise, Best of Twitter May 27, 2014 Dangerous rates [Re: Britain’s mortgage prisoners must act now or face financial meltdown, Friday] The fate of the “mortgage prisoners” (those who have used the opportunity of low rates to take out misjudged loans for new properties) is no doubt troubling. But to argue that this means we should put off a rise in base [...]
Q and A May 22, 2014 EXECUTIVE DIRECTOR, DOUGLAS & GORDON The Bank of England is deploying the Mortgage Market Review to cool the property market down, but sometimes good old market forces can, and usually do, take care of things on their own. Land Registry figures show a fall in average house prices of 0.4 per cent in a month. [...]
Britain’s mortgage prisoners must act now or face financial meltdown May 22, 2014 IT’s BEEN a busy week in the world of monetary policy. On Sunday, Mark Carney said that rising house prices pose the biggest threat to economic recovery. On Tuesday, the official statistics told us what we already knew – that house prices in London are soaring, by 17 per cent year-on-year. Some homeowners are finding [...]
Consumer recovery heating up May 21, 2014 Retail sales jump by 6.9 per cent in April – the fastest year-on-year growth in a decade Mortgage lending rises by 36 per cent as Britons say they feel more secure in their jobs But policymakers at the Bank of England still voted unanimously to keep interest rates low INTEREST rates are not expected to go [...]
Britain’s angry voters are about to trigger a political earthquake May 21, 2014 VOTERS are very, very angry, as the political establishment is about to find out at its great cost. If the opinion polls are to be believed, Ukip will do remarkably well and could even triumph in today’s European elections, and the Greens will also outperform. It will be a political earthquake and the day that [...]
Brace for impact: Bank of England issues warning on house prices May 21, 2014 Super low interest rates could inflate a housing bubble, the Bank of England admitted today, indicating it could step in to cool the rampant market soon. The monetary policy committee (MPC) said it will not raise interest rates to tackle to risks yet, but has pointed to the financial policy committee (FPC) as a [...]
Lloyds caps mortgages May 20, 2014 LLOYDS Bank yesterday announced a shock clampdown on home lending designed to tackle the London housing boom, saying applications for mortgages worth over £500,000 would now be subject to a new income test. Borrowers will now only be able to get their hands on over half a million pounds from the UK’s biggest mortgage lender [...]