Mortgage approvals down 60 percent

The lack of affordable housing has really hurt the UK property market further and even though there was actually a small increase in the number of approvals in September from August, the numbers according to the British Bankers are still disastrously low with only 23,422 approvals.

The small increase is not being viewed particularly favourably by economists as many predict that the housing slowdown will continue for many months to come.

The 10% increase between August and September is minimal considering the drop, and the figure is also put into perspective as the number of remortgages is over twice that of the number of mortgages used to purchase property.

Currently net mortgage lending increased to £3.6bn in September from just £2.1bn in August, although this marks a seven-year low.

The BBA has announced, following the production of the figures, that they were not surprised by the low lending levels even though the government made its move to re-ignite the housing market by raising the stamp duty mark to £175,000 in order to aid first time buyers.

It has been a tale of two halves though as despite the respite offers by the government in terms of stamp duty and bank rescue, it seems as though the financial markets are not ready to respond.

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