After Wednesday’s less-than-expected fall of inflation to 8.7% in the year to April (from 10.1% in March), mortgage lenders have responded with rate changes on a host of products.
The key driver here is the expectation that interest rates are likely to rise further – not fall as some had hoped.
Analysts are now anticipating a Bank of England rate as high as 5.5% by the end of the year.
Rightmove mortgage expert Matt Smith believes the lenders who have acted already are likely to be followed by more names in the near term.
“It’s early days, but we’ve seen the first major lender significantly increase rates and it’s likely that we’ll see other lenders follow suit, though the full impact may take a few weeks to filter through.
“An increase in fixed-rates was likely to happen following the news earlier in the week that inflation had not fallen as much as markets had predicted”.
He continues: “Subsequently the underlying costs of mortgages to lenders has increased and it appears they’re now starting to pass this on through their fixed-deals. We’ve seen average rates creep up from where they were earlier in the week and we expect some further increases in the coming weeks”.
Smith stresses that though the upward trajectory of mortgage rates will understandably be concerning to those thinking of moving soon, it’s important to remember that right now rates are still lower than they were on average in February before edging down in March and April, and there are likely to be more twists and turns to come with the ongoing uncertainty over inflation.