Mortgage market in good health: the overall Italian data speaks, in fact, of an increase of 18% in loans granted by banks for the purchase of a house. If we review Italy - photographed by research by the Abbey-Cattolica Observatory on the first quarter of this year - the best results at a regional level belong to Emilia Romagna, Lazio and Sardinia (with increases of 45, 44 and 40% respectively).
Rome and Milan are firmly at the top of the list of the top ten provinces where the disbursement of new mortgages is most consistent (see table): the global figures exceed 928 million euros for the first and over 820 million for the second. With one difference: in Rome in the first quarter of this year the amounts grew by 41%, in Milan, however, in the same period there was a slight decrease (-0.14%). A figure that goes against the trend with the rest of the Italian cities: for example, in Turin or Bologna - in third and fifth place in the ranking respectively - mortgage issuance rose by 33 and 61 percent respectively. Excluding the 'top ten' Italian cities, which overall 'eats' a slice of around half of the market (46%), the exploit in terms of loans to buy a house was recorded by Frosinone (+162%), Arezzo (+98%) and Cremona (+89%) even if the total amounts lent remain rather limited (around 37, 55 and 68 million euros respectively).
'What makes the mortgage panorama so attractive - explains Donatella Squellerio, marketing director of Abbey National - are the advantageous interest rates. Indeed, on this point the ECB should not adjust the reference values for the rest of 2002, at most we could speak of a downward adjustment'.
In recent years the sector has shown a downward curve while from the end of 2001 to today the trend has turned positive again. The reasons are to be found in the disappointing results of other investment instruments (first and foremost the stock market), but also in the different attitude of Italian families towards mortgages, 'no longer seen - concludes Squellerio - as a 'gabelle' to purchase a house, but as an alternative to investing in real estate, whether to buy a first or second home, or a property to rent'.
source: Il Sole 24 Ore
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