95% mortgages ‘needed to inject life’ into housing market

A return of 90-95 per cent loan-to-values (LTV) is needed to inject life into the mortgage market, it has been claimed.

Gareth Samples, sales director at Your Move, has suggested that first-time buyers will find it increasingly difficult to get onto the property ladder unless lenders begin offering high LTVs again.

“The first-time buyer mortgages at 90, 95 and 100 per cent were pulled and that takes a whole sector of the market out,” he remarked.

However, he noted that those who can afford a high deposit or have a large amount of equity in their home “will be ok”.

Recent research carried out by the Co-Operative Bank and Places for People revealed that the average first-time buyer felt that they needed £19,100 to get into the property market.

In addition, many of those that were seeking debt help thought that renting was equivalent to “throwing money down the drain”.

By Jamie Price