Variable rate mortgages more popular

All of a sudden, following the sharp reduction in the OCR and floating mortgage rates, many more borrowers are converting their fixed rate mortgages to variable rate ones. In the past three months, the number of variable rate mortgages has risen by 12% from 350,800 at the end of August, to 392,400 by the end of November, arrording to the latest RBNZ data. Meanwhile, the number of fixed rate mortgages has fallen 2%, dropping from 971,200 three months ago, to 953,500 at the end of November. The growth in bank mortgage lending has slowed significantly also, rising its slowest since May 2003. A full listing of all mortgage rates can be found here >>>