Lack of buy-to-let mortgages 'constraining market'

Date:Friday 8th May 2009
Author: Max Freedman

A lack of buy-to-let mortgages is constraining the number of new landlords entering the market, an expert has claimed.

Chris Horne, editor of Property Hawk, made his comments in the wake of figures produced by moneysupermarket.com which revealed that the number of buy-to-let home loans available has decreased by 95 per cent over the last two years.

The organisation found that the number of mortgages available to landlords has fallen from 4,384 to 213 over the period.

Mr Horne said that one of the main issues facing landlords is the unappealing terms offered when remortgaging a property.

He commented: "One of the things which was propelling the buy-to-let lending boom was that after two or three years a landlord could switch and get very competitive fixed-term ... but those products no longer exist."

The expert added that the "boom" in buy-to-let lending experienced over the last two or three years is at an end.