Residential Mortgage Survey Results for September 2009

According to the 23 authorized institutions (AIs) which participate in the HKMA's monthly survey of residential mortgage lending, new mortgage loans drawn down during September rose by 17.0% to HK$23.3 billion compared with August.

New loans approved fell by 2.5% to HK$33.3 billion. The decline was mainly due to reduction of HK$1.2 billion or 24.6% in primary market transactions and of HK$0.8 billion or 3.4% in approvals for secondary market transactions. By contrast, approvals for refinancing loans increased by HK$1.2 billion or 26.1%. The number of new applications increased slightly to 19,519 compared with 19,441 in August.

Around 42% of the new mortgage loans approved in September were priced at more than 2.5% below the best lending rate, compared with 47% in August. The proportion of new mortgage loans priced with reference to rates other than the best lending rate (mostly HIBOR) increased to 54.5% in September from 49.8% in August.

The outstanding value of mortgage loans increased by 1.3% to HK$626.0 billion.

The mortgage delinquency ratio and the rescheduled loan ratio remained stable at 0.05% and 0.11% respectively in September.

Annex

For further enquiries, please contact:
Peggy Lo, Manager (Communications), at 2878 1687 or
Hing-fung Wong, Manager (Communications), at 2878 1802

Hong Kong Monetary Authority
27 October 2009