Hong Kong's mortgage loans fall sharply in November

HONG KONG, Dec. 29 (Chinese media) -- Hong Kong's housing market took a harsh hit in November from the economic downturn with its new residential mortgage lending drawn down in November plunging 28.4 percent to 8.1 billion HK dollars (1.05 billion U.S. dollars), revealed the Monetary Authority's latest monthly survey.

New mortgage approvals were also down by 37.9 percent year on year to 8.5 billion HK dollars (1.1 billion U.S. dollars), according to the Monetary Authority, Hong Kong's de facto central bank.

Approvals for primary market transactions fell by 400 million HK dollars (51.67 million U.S. dollars), or 24.7 percent, from the same month in 2007.

Approvals for secondary market transactions dropped 37.4 percent, or 3.5 billion HK dollars (452 million U.S. dollars) while the approvals for refinancing loans plunged 49.1 percent, or1.3 billion HK dollars (168 million U.S. dollars).

The proportion of new loans approved at more than 2.5 percent below the best lending rate fell to 15 percent from 51.7 percent in October. The outstanding value of mortgage loans remained little changed at 600 billion HK dollars (77.5 billion U.S. dollars).

The mortgage delinquency ratio remained unchanged at 0.05 percent and the rescheduled loan ratio remained at 0.13 percent. The combined ratio remained at a record low of 0.18 percent.