The number of housing mortgages increased by 4% last September compared to the same month of 2021, to 44,119 loans, the highest figure in the month of September since 2010, when more than 53,000 mortgages were signed, according to data released Wednesday by the National Statistics Institute (INE).
With the year-on-year increase in September, more than six points lower than that experienced in August, the signing of loans on homes has been rising for 19 consecutive months.
The average amount of mortgages on homes fell by 1.4% year-on-year in the ninth month of the year, to 143.222 euros, while the capital loaned grew by 4.6%, to 6,318.8 million euros.
By autonomous communities, those that registered the highest number of mortgages on homes in September 2022 were Madrid (8,836), Andalusia (7,769) and Catalonia (7,683).
Likewise, the regions in which more capital was lent for the constitution of mortgages on homes were Madrid (1,645.2 million euros), Catalonia (1,289.2 million) and Andalusia (979.1 million).
In eight communities more mortgages on homes were signed in September than in the same month of 2021 and nine recorded year-on-year declines. The largest increases were in Galicia (30.3%), Cantabria (19.6%) and Aragón (14.5%), while the largest decreases were in Castilla y León (-10.3%), Andalusia (-10.2%) and Navarra (-9.8%).
In the first nine months of the year, the number of loans for home purchases increased by 12.9%, while the capital loaned rose by 19.8%.
Fixed-rate mortgages at yearly lows
On a month-on-month basis (September over August), borrowing for homes increased by 20.1%, while the capital loaned advanced by 18.4%. In both cases, these are their smallest rises in a September since 2019.
In September, the average interest rate for total loans stood at 2.59%, with an average term of 23 years. In the case of homes, the average interest rate was 2.47%, down from 2.48% a year earlier, with an average term of 24 years.
Last September, 31.8% of mortgages on homes were taken out at a variable rate, while 68.2% were signed at a fixed rate, the lowest percentage since December 2021. The average interest rate at the beginning was 1.96% for loans on variable-rate homes and 2.70% for fixed-rate mortgages.
According to data from the statistical agency, the number of loans on rural and urban properties (the latter include homes) increased by 2% in September 2022 compared to the same month in 2021, to a total of 56,867 loans.
The capital of mortgage loans granted increased by 9.2% in the ninth month of the year, to over 8,983 million euros, while the average amount of mortgages constituted on the total number of properties rose by 7.1% and totaled 157,973 euros.
Mortgages with condition changes fall
Last September a total of 11,140 loans changed their conditions, a figure 45.4% lower than in the same month of 2021.
According to the type of change in conditions, there were 8,799 amendments (or modifications made with the same financial institution), with an annual decrease of 47.5%.
The number of operations that changed institution (subrogations to the creditor) was 1,708, 33% less than in September 2021. In 633 mortgages, the holder of the mortgaged property changed (subrogations to the debtor), 41.9% less than a year earlier.
Of the 11,140 loans with changes in their conditions, 32.5% were due to changes in interest rates. After the change in conditions, the percentage of fixed rate loans increased from 16.8% to 49.9%, while the percentage of variable rate mortgages decreased from 81.6% to 48%.
Euribor is the rate wtih highest percentage of variable rate loans, both before the change (76.4%) and after (45.6%).
After the change in conditions, the average interest rate on fixed-rate loans decreased by 0.7 points and that of variable-rate loans fell by four tenths.
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