The home mortgage firm rises 3.8% in February and the average interest moderates to 3.33%

This is clear from the data released today by the National Institute of Statistics (INE), which highlights that, with the year-on-year increase in February, the signing of home mortgages returns to positive rates after 12 months of chaining declines.

María Matos, Director of Studies at Fotocasa, points out that the February data "shows a small change in trend in mortgages due to the stability that the Euribor is showing in recent months, after the ECB has not made any further increases in types recently."

"The year will probably be differentiated between two marked stages, the one before interest rates fall and the one after. If the forecasts for de-escalation in rates by the ECB are confirmed and begin in June, we will once again see how the Access to housing improves as the conditions for access to mortgage credit are lowered and the demand that was kept waiting will return to the market with force," adds Matos.

Juan Villén, general director of Idealista/mortgages agree that "the volume of mortgages registered in February already shows a slight but certain recovery, which began to occur at the beginning of this year." In his opinion, "it is very possible that this trend will continue in the coming months, but the shortage of housing supply could slow down this recovery."

"Interest rates are also beginning to reflect the drop in the Euribor, as well as greater competition between banks," says Villén. "This strong mortgage war is being fought fundamentally in fixed and mixed mortgages, which continue to dominate the market," she adds.

For his part, Ferran Font, director of Studies at Pisos.com, indicates that the INE statistics "show the change in trend in the sector that was already anticipated in sales." Font highlights that the borrowed capital follows the same dynamic and contracts only 1.6% "getting closer to the growth that, in all probability, will reach next month."

The average amount of mortgages constituted on homes fell by 5.2% year-on-year in the second month of the year, to 136,145 euros, while the capital lent decreased by 1.6%, to 5,068.9 million euros.

Following the interest rate policy carried out by the European Central Bank (ECB) to try to contain inflation and the evolution of the Euribor, the average interest rate was 3.33% in February for mortgages constituted on homes, with an average term of 23 years. In this way, it decreased slightly from 3.46% in January, when it reached its highest value since the end of 2014. With the exception of January, February has been the highest interest since December 2015, the month in which was 3.36%.

Compared to a year earlier, the average interest rate for home loans has increased almost half a point. It is the eleventh consecutive month in which the interest rate exceeds 3%.

44.7% of mortgages were established in February at a variable rate and 55.3% at a fixed rate. The average interest rate at the beginning was 3.07% for variable rate home mortgages and 3.57% for fixed rate mortgages.