Home repossessions ‘will increase’

It is “inevitable” that the number of home repossessions will start to rise in the near future, one expert has suggested.

UK Insolvency Helpline money advice coordinator Ian Boden-Smyth indicated that the low base rate is helping people to keep up with their mortgage payments at the moment, but this will change when the rate begins to rise.

“What we are worried about is it might just be a sticking plaster and we will see a lot more repossessions … once the mortgage base rate goes up,” he said.

However, he explained that his organisation has received feedback from lenders saying they do not wish to repossess properties as such actions garner a lot of bad publicity.

There were ten per cent less repossessions during the second quarter of 2009 than in the previous three months, according to the latest Council of Mortgage Lenders figures.

Nevertheless, the total of 11,400 was still 14 per cent higher than during the second quarter of 2008.

By Chris Trimble