Credit crunch impact 'still minimal'

The credit crunch has had a limited impact on the wider mortgage market, with first-time buyers similarly unaffected at this stage, the Council of Mortgage Lenders (CML) has said.

While noting that existing problems for first-time buyers continued to represent significant challenges to getting onto the property ladder, the CML said that the demographic was not being targeted by lenders as a result of financial difficulties.

Adding that it was too early to tell what the long-term effects on the market would be, Bernard Clarke of the CML noted that rate increases announced thus far would have a minimal impact.

"For prime mortgages any price adjustments so far have been very modest and at this stage there doesn’t appear to be any indication of there being any higher costs for first-time buyers in particular," Mr Clarke noted.

"But the changes that have been made essentially have been to tracker products, so these have been very modest, certainly by the major lenders who adjust those by rates of between 0.1 and 0.2 per cent," he added.


© Adfero Ltd