New mortgage loans drawn down during November rose 8.9% to $10.5 billion, the Monetary Authority says.

A monthly survey of 23 authorised institutions found that approved new loans grew by a third to $15.7 billion and the number of new applications grew 22.9%.

Increases were recorded across the board with primary market transactions rising $1.8 billion (+62%), secondary market transactions up $1.3 billion (+21%) and refinancing loans up $800 million (+29.3%).

The outstanding value of mortgage loans remained mainly unchanged at $526.2 billion.

November saw the mortgage delinquency ratio edge down to 0.19% from 0.21%. The rescheduled loan ratio stayed unchanged at 0.28% while the combined ratio improved to 0.47% from 0.49%.

The proportion of new loans approved at more than 2.5% below the best lending rate fell to 54.8% from 58.1% in October, while the proportion of new approvals priced with reference to rates other than the best lending rate or fixed rates increased to 40.3% from 34.8% over the same period. The increase was mainly attributable to HIBOR-based loans.