Bank of England Mortgage Approvals and Lending May 2022

Annual growth in secured lending rose by 4.4% in May, from 4.3% in the previous month.
- Consumers’ net borrowing of mortgage debt increased to £7.4 billion in May, up from £4.2 billion in April. This is above the pre-pandemic average of £4.3 billion in the year to February 2020.

Mortgage approvals increased to 66,163 in May, from 66,064 in April. This is slightly below the 12-month pre-pandemic average of 66,700.
- Compared with the same month a year ago, mortgage approvals fell by 24%.

The number of approvals for re-mortgaging (with a different lender) dipped slightly to 47,770 in May from 47,824 in the previous month.
- This is the below the pre-pandemic average of 49,500.

Source: Bank of England

Annual growth in unsecured lending rose by 5.7% in May – unchanged from the previous month which was the highest rate since February 2020.
- Consumers borrowed an additional £0.8bn in credit in May following £1.4bn of borrowing in April. This is lower than the 12-month pre-pandemic average of £1.0bn.
- New credit card lending to consumers was £0.4bn in May (£0.7bn in April).
- Other forms of consumer credit (such as car dealership finance and personal loans) also rose by £0.4bn. Worryingly, its annual growth rate of 3.5% is the highest rate since March 2020.

Source: Bank of England