Buying a house remains difficult for many households. Since the comparison portal takes over on Wednesday, an average pair with a double earner for a new apartment of 90 m2 in Vienna should spend 53 percent of its net income on the loan in June. Significantly more than that of the financial market regulator (FMA) as sustainable debt ratios of a maximum of 40 percent. Possible exceptions have recently used a bit.
“The interest of the ECB ends in the end, so that the high real estate prices in particular remain a bottleneck for affordability,” explains the director Martin Spona in the broadcast. However, there was a slight improvement. On average of the previous year 2024, the same average budget would have used 61 percent of the loan income.
Criticism of the FMA
The awarding rules for real estate loans had recently become a political issue. The corresponding KIM Regulation expired at the end of June and therefore no longer legally binding on the banks. However, the FMA warned the Geldhuizen to continue to follow the rules.
This caused a lot of criticism in the ranks of banks and politics. Recently on Wednesday on Wednesday by the Secretary General of the freedom economy, Reinhard Langthaler, who accused the FMA an “anti -economy course” with which the “an urgent necessary use in the construction sector” torpedoed. “The strict rules for loans when the apartment acquires deep the entire real estate sector and his employees,” says Johannes Wild, chairman of the Specialist Group of Real Estate and Wealth Lacer in the Lower Austria Chamber of Commerce (Wknö). Buyers and companies can now ‘breathe’ after the end of the KIM Regulation.
FMA -Baas Helmut ETTL defended the procedure of his authority in an interview with the Upper Austrian News (Oön). Since 2016 there has been a corresponding recommendation at the banks. After the KIM-VO has expired, you will now return to this state. Before the KIM-VO (2022) came into force, 90 percent of the loans would no longer have met the criteria, he argues. The demand for credit will also be attracted again until this year despite the KIM-VO.
OENB: KIM-VO not the limiting factor for loans
The KIM Regulation provided for a share of at least 20 percent and a maximum of 40 percent of a maximum period of 35 years. However, the banks were able to deviate from these rules in 20 percent of the loans granted – an exception that, despite the criticism of the rules that are too strict, only used to a small extent, as the National Bank (OENB) wrote in its recent report of financial market stability.
More and more loans with a fixed interest rate
For people who absorb a real estate loan, the meantime recommends that you are looking forward to a fixed interest rate. Most of them also meet, as numbers from the Oenb show. In April, new loans worth 1,577 million euros were awarded – 88 percent of them up to fixed and 12 percent for variable interest. There has been a clear trend here in recent years: in 2020 and 2021 the permanent share was only just over 60 percent in the entire quarter. The quota has been more than 75 percent since half past 2023.
Source: Krone
I’m Ben Stock, a journalist and author at Today Times Live. I specialize in economic news and have been working in the news industry for over five years. My experience spans from local journalism to international business reporting. In my career I’ve had the opportunity to interview some of the world’s leading economists and financial experts, giving me an insight into global trends that is unique among journalists.
