Borrowing to buy a home is becoming more and more expensive. The average rate of mortgages has indeed exceeded the 3% mark in March for the first time since 2014, reaching 3.04%, according to calculations by Crédit Logement published on Tuesday, enough to deter or even rule out many borrowers.
“Access to the market is becoming more and more difficult, both for borrowers with low personal contributions and for wealthier households,” argue the authors of the CSA Observatory / Credit Housing. In question, the policy of central banks to counter inflation increases the cost of money for banks, which pass it on to their customers to maintain their margins.
A rate below 1% at the start of 2022
The figures announced each month by Crédit Logement, however, differ from those of the Banque de France, which estimates the average rate for March at 2.52%. The latter have the merit of relating to the entire market, unlike those of the mortgage loan guarantee specialist, the result of restatement on the basis of partial data. The increase in the average rate for mortgages is nonetheless significant, especially since the beginning of 2022, when the two sources agreed on a rate just above 1%.
Crédit Logement also released its statistics on the production of new loans, down around 30% in France in the first quarter over one year. Such a fall “is more pronounced than that observed during the 2008 financial crisis, or during the first confinement”, notes the Observatory.
Debates around the conditions of access to credit
The mortgage market is the scene of a battle of figures between brokers, bankers and regulators. After the usury rate, now revised monthly by the Banque de France and not quarterly, it is the rules conditioning access to credit that are at the center of the debates.
Faced with the decline in the granting of mortgages, the Ministry of Finance now wants to ensure that the standards aimed at protecting against over-indebtedness do not become an obstacle to access to credit. In the viewfinder: the limit since January 2022 to 35% of the effort rate, that is to say the total amount of the expenses related to the housing of the borrower compared to his income, and that at 27 years of the duration of indebtedness. However, establishments have the option of derogating from these criteria for 20% of credits, under certain conditions.