This year has got off to a strange start. Very quiet for the first two weeks of January, very busy for the last two, then quiet again for the beginning of February. But, clearly, we are living through unique times.
For the first time in nearly 30 years, borrowers are going to have to contend with a market in which there is more demand for mortgages than there is supply of funding. For most of the last three decades, mortgage funding has been abundant and growing all the time.
The much discussed (here and elsewhere) difficulties of the American mortgage market and its knock-on effect in the mortgage market here in the UK is really beginning to bite. As predicted, more secondary lenders are starting to withdraw from the market – Morgan Stanley’s Advantage Home Loans being just the latest – and those lenders who remain are being overwhelmed with demand when they have a fairly competitive rate.
