Continued Growth in Mortgage Approvals in May

Banking & Payments Federation Ireland (BPFI) has today published the latest figures from the BPFI Mortgage Approvals Report for May 2022. The following are the key elements:

• A total of 5,355 mortgages were approved in May 2022 – first-time buyers (FTBs) were approved for 2,640 mortgages (49.3% of total volume) while mover purchasers accounted for 1,082 (20.2%).
• The number of mortgages approved rose by 24.4% month-on-month and by 14.3% compared with the same period last year.
• Mortgages approved in May 2022 were valued at €1,453 million – of which FTBs accounted for €732 million (50.4%) and mover purchasers for €346 million (23.8%).
• The value of mortgage approvals rose by 24.8% month-on-month and by 25.3% year-on-year.
• Re-mortgage/switching grew by 111.5% to 1,237 in volume terms year on year and by 129.3% year-on-year to €329 million over the same period. 

Speaking on the publication of the data, Brian Hayes, Chief Executive, BPFI stated: “Our latest mortgage approvals data shows continued growth in mortgage approval activity in May and it’s clear that switching activity has grown sharply in recent months. During the month of May switching volumes and values more than doubled in year-on-year terms with switching levels at their highest ever recorded since BPFI began collecting this data in 2011.”

“FTBs still accounted for about half of mortgage approvals both in volume and value terms, these latest June figures are notably dominated by mortgage switching activity and May was one of the strongest performances recorded for FTB approvals. This is particularly true for approval values, with a significant increase in average loan values year on year driving strong growth in lending values. This is likely driven by higher housing prices. In fact, May 2022 saw the second highest recorded value for FTB approvals (after October 2020) and the seventh highest for mover purchase.”