Mortgages are soaring, but those for first homes are declining.

BarcelonaThe number of mortgages taken out for home purchases continues to rise. Last January, just six months after the European Central Bank (ECB) decided to initiate a policy of lowering interest rates, the number of mortgage loans registered its best first month of the year since 2011, with 6,936 home mortgages.

However, this reality has been out of step with the housing market, which, despite coming off a period of high interest rates, which has led to fewer mortgage loans, has not seen a similar reduction in the number of sales transactions. In fact, the monetary policy to cool the economy launched by the ECB in July 2022, with the first interest rate hike in eleven years,had a strong impact on the mortgage market but not in the sales market, which registered a record year in 2022, a good year in 2023 and a better exercise in 2024.

One of the explanations behind this altered behavior between mortgages and transactions is the rising purchase of homes without a mortgage: whether through personal or family savings, or made with foreign capital. Now, mortgage data for January indicate that the mortgage market is starting off strongly, but this does not mean that more people are taking out loans to buy a first home.

In fact, according to the financial association Asufin, mortgages have dropped in price by 0.7% compared to last year in Spain, but this is a smaller drop than that of the Euribor (-1.08%), the interbank interest rate at which most mortgages are fixed. Furthermore, the number of users who have taken out a mortgage as an investment has grown from 51% to 56%, while those who have taken out a mortgage to buy their first home have decreased from 16% to 14%. This means that mortgages for investment are now four times as many as those for a first home. According to this association, this puts pressure on the market because some of the housing purchased as an investment doesn't reach the market or is sold for non-residential uses, such as tourist housing or short-term rentals.

Public housing tenders have skyrocketed.

Residential housing tenders issued by public administrations reached their highest figure in the last 16 years in January, with bids totaling €174.7 million, up 476.7% compared to the same month in 2024. Furthermore, of all public works tendered, those allocated to €6 million, nearly €3.2 million were for housing.