Interest for owning home returns, banks see pick up in loans

New Delhi, March 5 People have started buying their dream home again after the Covid-19 induced lockdown and economic disruptions completely dried out new purchases.

Such has been the renewed customer interest in housing that builders are selling even tough-to-sell, non-'vastu' houses without offering much discount.

And the numbers are showing that the housing activity is again picking up momentum. According to a report by Emkay Global Financial Services, systemic monthly mortgage disbursement in February has been at a high of Rs 75,000 crore as against Rs 40,000 crore average. This is mainly due to pent-up demand driven by benign rates, attractive property prices, low stamp duty (temporary though in Maharashtra) and change in customer behaviour to house ownership/bigger house size.

Financial distributor Andromeda has clocked nearly Rs 2,100 crore in disbursement in February (up 20 per cent YoY) with home loans at Rs 1,250 crore (60 per cent of disbursement).

After a dip in H1FY21, systemic retail loan growth trend remained healthy in H2FY21 (up 9 per cent YoY/7 per cent YTD) with mortgage growing 8 per cent YoY/6 per cent YTD amid the festive cheer, the brokerage said in its report.

Among large players, SBI leads the pack with nearly 31 per cent market share in recent disbursements made in the mortgage segment, followed by the HDFC group at 19 per cent , ICICI at 13 per cent , BOB at 9 per cent and Axis at 7 per cent . Kotak has shown fresh aggression in line with management's guidance, with 3 per cent market share in home loan disbursements in February.

"We expect overall retail credit growth to accelerate further (currently 9 per cent YoY vs 15 per cent last year), led by mortgages (contributing 51 per cent of retail loans) and back-end support by unsecured (Cards/PL) and vehicle loans," the brokerage said.