First-time Buyers
Borrowing dominates online finance searches
7 in 10 online searches for personal finance products in October were for mortgages, loans and credit cards.
According to digital marketing agency Greenlight, the number of searches for borrowing increased from 2.4m in July to over 2.5m in October – a 6% rise.
Of the 2.48m borrowing searches carried out in October, 60% were for mortgages. The most searched for term was ‘mortgage calculator’, which attracted 550,000 in the month.
Searches for savings and investments fell by 18% between July and October.
Greenlight claims that the increase in borrowing searches is a result of ultra-low interest rates – it points out that mortgage approvals hit a five-year high in September, personal loan rates fell below 5% on average and the number of short-term interest-free credit cards surged at the same time.