Residential Mortgage Survey Results for January 2004

According to the HKMA’s monthly survey of residential mortgage lending, new loans drawn down during January fell by 16.7% to HK$7.2 billion.

New mortgage approvals, on the other hand, increased by 11.5% to HK$9.6 billion, with those for primary and secondary market transactions growing at a similar pace.

The proportion of new approvals priced at more than 2.5% below the best lending rate edged down to 65.2% from 65.5% in December. More fixed rate mortgages were approved in January, as indicated by the proportion of new approvals priced other than with reference to the best lending rate, which increased to 4.5% from 3.2% in December.

The outstanding amount of mortgage loans fell slightly by 0.1% to HK$521.5 billion.

The improvement in quality of the mortgage portfolio continued. The mortgage delinquency ratio and the rescheduled loan ratio dropped to 0.83% and 0.51% respectively from 0.86% and 0.52% in December. As a result, the combined ratio lowered to 1.34% from 1.38%.

New loans drawn down for purchasing properties in Mainland China decreased to HK$207 million. The amount of outstanding loans at the end of the month was HK$6.5 billion.

For further enquiries, please contact:

Jasmin Fung, Manager (Press), at 2878 8246 or
Thomas Chan, Senior Manager (Press), at 2878 1480

Hong Kong Monetary Authority
27 February 2004

Annex

Residential Mortgage Survey

1. The Residential Mortgage Survey is a continuous monthly survey covering 25 authorized institutions in the banking industry.
   
   

2. Residential mortgage loans (RMLs) in this survey are loans (including refinancing loans) to private individuals for the purchase of residential properties, including uncompleted units, but other than those properties under the Home Ownership Scheme, the Private Sector Participation Scheme and the Tenants Purchase Scheme.
   
   

3. Gross new loans made are new mortgage loans drawn down during the surveyed month.
   
   

4. New loans approved are mortgage loans approved during the surveyed month. The loans can either be drawn down in the same month or in the following months. Loans that are approved but not yet drawn, which have implications for the amount of gross new loans made in the following months, are shown under the item “New loans approved during month but not yet drawn”.
   
   

5. Delinquency ratio is measured by a ratio of total amount of overdue loans to total outstanding loans.
   
   

6. Rescheduled loan ratio is measured by a ratio of total amount of rescheduled loans to total outstanding loans.
   
   

7. Co-financing schemes refer to those schemes that involve provision of top-up finance by property developer(s) or other co-financier(s) in addition to mortgage loans advanced by authorized institutions. For loans associated with co-financing schemes, only the portion of loans advanced by reporting institutions is included in this survey.
   
   

8. Average loan-to-value ratio and average contractual life for new loans approved during the surveyed month are average figures weighted by the amount of new loans approved during the surveyed month by individual reporting institutions.
   
   

9. Loans written off over the past 12 months as a percentage of the average outstanding loans is calculated as: total value of loans written off during the past 12-month period as a percentage of the average outstanding loan value over the 12-month period [i.e. (opening + closing) ¸ 2].