Skipton's gross mortgage lending up by almost a quarter

Skipton Building Society’s annual results shows the Society has enabled significantly more members to achieve their home ownership aspirations with new loans totalling £3.0 billion – up from £2.4 billion last year.

The  building society demonstrated its contribution to supporting the UK housing market, growing its mortgage book by £1.3bn to £12.7bn. And despite having a 0.9% share of mortgage balances, Skipton’s net residential mortgage lending actually accounted for 5.3% of the growth in the UK mortgage market – punching well above its weight of natural market share.

Established in 1853 to enable people to buy their own homes, in 2014 - 161 years later - Skipton helped 19,512 homeowners purchase or remortgage their properties. This includes getting 2,946 first time buyers the keys to their first home.

For those involved in renting properties, the rental market remained strong last year. Skipton’s buy-to-let lending portfolio has historically performed well and 2014 was no different - with £323m of new lending going on buy-to-let mortgages.

2014 also signalled the launch of a new era of intermediary lending for the Society. The intermediary arm of Skipton has evolved its brand and values, launching a real life lending charter for brokers - underpinning the way they mutually work together. Modern branding, new resources, improved website and a common sense approach to lending is what brokers and key distributors now receive from Skipton Intermediaries.

Paul Darwin, Skipton’s Head of Intermediary Sales, said: “2014 was an outstanding year of lending for Skipton. But our commitment to supporting the UK housing market extends much further than numbers. We have taken our mutual proposition to a growing number of mortgage members and intermediary partners and remain committed to delivering what is important to them - offering a wide variety of affordable competitive products to suit all mortgage needs.

“We have punched well above our weight with our lending over the past year, with our mortgage book growing by over 11%. And our gross residential mortgage lending is up 23% to £3.0bn.

“A real strength of our lending success is the relationship we have with our intermediary partners. Skipton Intermediaries has evolved and our broker partners can see we really do mean what we say when we want to support them with offering great service and competitive solutions to their clients real life lending needs.

“Looking forward, the next twelve months will be interesting. The housing market remains in a state of unrest with the strength of the economic recovery, mortgage market and housing market all moderating towards the end of 2014. Early indications in 2015 are that there has been a slight improvement in many of these areas since the year end, and mortgage competition remains strong. We will watch with interest on the outcome of the general election, bank base rate predictions and the ongoing turbulence in the Eurozone. But we look forward to continuing on the strides we have made in the mortgage arena throughout the rest of the year.”