House prices expected to fall as UK mortgage approvals hit record low

JACK BARNETT

MORTGAGE approvals have plummeted to their lowest since the credit crunch after the global financial crisis in 2008, excluding the pandemic when the housing market was shut down, in a sign that house prices could fall sharply soon, according to official data.

The number of loans to Brits to fund home purchases dropped by more than a fifth over the last month to 35,612, down from 46,186 in November, Bank of England numbers show.

It is the lowest monthly figure since January 2009 –when stripping out Covid-19 distortions–a time when Britain’s biggest high street lenders retreated from lending people money for fear they would be unable to repay