CEO reveals off-the-cuff statistic at meeting of Treasury select committee

RBS Group — the banking conglomerate that owns mortgage lenders Natwest, Royal Bank Of Scotland, Ulsterbank, First Active and Coutts & Co — claimed that it had stepped "into the breach" of UK mortgage lending since many other lenders had disappeared from the market.

Its chief executive Stephen Hester, speaking before a panel of MPs, described the bank as something of a safe haven for beleagured borrowers:

"[I]f you are someone in search of a mortgage, nine out of ten times we will sell this to you […] I think that is an appropriate statistic."

If that's really true, borrowers with 75 per cent loan to value ought to put this claim to the test and besiege RBS for one of their 3.75%, £299 fee, variable tracker mortgages with no tie-in period (i.e. you can be off again when rates do the inevitable).  Feel free to report back any experiences in the comments!

Buyers, not remortgagers, will benefit from HSBC's increased lending quota

HSBC has responded to growing demand from first-time buyers, announcing an increase in the amount of money it is earmarking for purchase loans at the 90% loan to value limit.

The bank's £500 million increase in allocated lending should enable around 3,650 additional house purchases between now and the New Year (based on an average first-time purchase price of £150,289).

HSBC Head of Mortgages, Martijn van der Heijden, comments that many buyers who put off purchasing last year are now heading back to the housing market as they have seen reports of prices bottoming out.

If you want a fixed-rate 90 per cent mortgage, HSBC's rates work out as follows:

• 5.99 per cent fixed for 2 years
• 6.49 per cent fixed for 5 years
• Both these deals cost £599 in fees.

Competing deals are available from NatWest (5 years at 5.99 per cent, with no fees) and Yorkshire Bank (2 years at 5.99 per cent, with a £999 fee).

HSBC is also offering 90 per cent LTV mortgages with tracker interest rates. You can opt for a 2-year discounted tracker (3.89%, booking fee £1199) or a lifetime tracker (4.09 per cent, booking fee £999).

The surprise is that competition for lending at this level is still so low.  However, with the cost of inter-bank lending having dropped from its credit-crunch high to a historically low rate, we might see more lenders boarding the 90% LTV bandwagon.