BuyingMortgage issues could end house market recovery
Potential buyers struggling to get mortgages could result in Britain's recovering housing market dipping again, a leading Bank of England decision maker has warned.
House prices fell around 20% during the credit crunch and while the market has recovered about half those losses banks are now more risk averse in terms of lending.
BoE policy maker Kate Barker said she was surprised by the rebound.
"It seems more likely than not to me that mortgage finance is clearly not going to be available going forward on the terms it used to be," she said.
"I was rather surprised by the strength of prices in the housing market through last year and it's possible some people delayed decisions to move or put houses on the market. In some sense that can't continue."