Bank of England Mortgage Approvals and Lending March 2021

Annual growth in secured lending accelerated in March, rising by 3.8% year-on-year, from 3.3% in February.
- The monthly change in the additional amount households borrowed totalled £11.8bn, a new record high, outpacing the previous six-month average of £5.6bn.
- The strength in borrowing was driven by the recent extension to the stamp duty holiday.
Mortgage approvals dipped in March, totalling 82,735 from 87,385 in February, below the previous six-month average of 96,125 but ahead of the pre-pandemic level of 73,000 (February 2020).
- Compared with the same month a year ago, mortgage approvals rose by 45%.
The number of re-mortgaging approvals totalled 34,767 in March, broadly unchanged from the previous month (34,459).
- This was ahead of the previous six-month average of 33,665 and around 18% lower than a year ago.

Source: Bank of England

Annual growth in unsecured lending eased in March, falling by 8.6% year-on-year from -10.0% in the previous month.
- Households made a net repayment of £0.5 billion in March, notably smaller than the average each month seen over the past year (£1.9bn).
- The weakness was driven by a £0.4bn net repayment on credit cards with a smaller net repayment on other loans and advances of £0.2bn.

Source: Bank of England