Mortgage loans leapt to $53b in March

Banks received nearly 18,000 applications during the month.

Mortgage loans approved in March increased by 39% month-on-month to $53b, the Hong Kong Monetary Authority (HKMA) reported in the residential mortgage survey.

Of this, loans financing primary market transactions rose 86.5% to $9.7b; whilst loans for secondary market transactions climbed 31.5% to $36.3b. Mortgage loan for refinancing also increased by 31.7% to $7.1b.

Mortgage loans drawn down during March increased by 56.3% compared with February to HK$30.2 billion.

The HKMA noted it received a total of 17,946 mortgage applications, reflecting a 44.1% increase month-on-month.

The ratio of new mortgage loans, priced with reference to Hong Kong Interbank Offered Rate, decreased slightly to 95.7% in March from 95.9% in February.

Meanwhile, the ratio of new mortgage loans, priced with reference to best lending rates, increased to 1.8% in March from 1.7% in February.

The outstanding value of mortgage loans increased by 0.6% MOM to $1.605t at end-March.

The mortgage delinquency ratio remained unchanged at 0.04% and the rescheduled loan ratio remained unchanged at nearly 0%.