More than a fifth of UK homebuyers who have a chequered credit history have fallen behind on their mortgage payments and even those with top-quality ratings have seen a statistically significant rise in delinquencies in the first three months of this year.
New data from Standard & Poor’s provides the first glimpse into how mortgages are performing this year. It is based on the behaviour of homebuyers whose loans have been packed into mortgage-backed securities – which accounts for 80 per cent of the £43bn subprime mortgage market.
Of all loans to borrowers with poor or no credit history, total delinquencies – defined as arrears of more than 30 days – made up 21.73 per cent at the end of March while those seriously delinquent by 90 days or more, including some already in foreclosure, edged into double digits at 10.60 per cent.
The figures show that more than £7bn worth of loans are at risk of default unless lenders agree to modify the loan terms. S&P believes that the loans backing the securities it rates are a representative sample of the market as a whole. The rise in subprime arrears threatens further problems not only for the economy but also for those financial institutions that bought securities backed by the loans.
Potentially more worrying is the small but notable increase in delinquency rates among prime mortgage-holders.
1 comment:
Glad you started your own blog, ACO.
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