The amount of new mortgage loans drawn down in September dipped 0.9%, to $8.5 billion, according to the Monetary Authority's monthly survey.

New loans approved by the 24 authorised institutions the survey covered fell 1.6%, to $9.8 billion. The decline was due to decreases of $347 million or 4.4% in approvals for secondary-market transactions, and of $50 million or 4.3% in approvals for refinancing. These decreases are more than the $237 million or 25.5% increase in approvals for primary-market transactions. The number of new applications also fell 2.9%.

The proportion of new loan approvals priced 2-2.25% below the best lending rate remained constant at 35.7%, and continued to be the most commonly used interest-rate band for new approvals in September.

After falling for two consecutive months, the proportion of new loan approvals priced 2.25-2.5% below the best lending rate went up to 27.3%, from 19.3% in August. The share of new approvals for fixed-rate mortgages also rose to 1.9% from only 0.1% in August.

The outstanding value of mortgage loans fell 0.3% to $538.6 billion. The mortgage delinquency ratio edged down to 0.18% from 0.19% a month earlier. With the rescheduled loan ratio falling to 0.36% from 0.37%, the combined ratio improved to 0.54% from 0.56% in August.