Bankers feel the heat as home loan queries fall

There is a slump in the market and its direct impact can be seen on the housing loans section of different banking divisions. According to many officials in the home loans divisions, the walk-in and enquiries have gone down by 50 per cent in many places.

One of the officials with Corporation Bank said that there is a major slump in the housing loans enquiries and even the walk-ins have reduced. "The property market has been affected badly because of various reasons resulting which the home loan divisions has been affected," said the official.

Apart from reasons like inflation and rise in home loan rates, another reason is that the affordability has also gone down said another official from HDFC home loans. He added that the enquiries and final confirmation is not as same as those that were there in the last few weeks. "When the property market had been good about three weeks back the walk-in had been much better as compared to the scene now," he said adding that on a positive note one also feels that probably the increasing competition in the home loan market is one of the reasons for this fall.

Avers an official from Reliance Capital who said that there is a fall in enquiries but the change is marginal. "There is probably a 30 per cent fall as compared to the last few weeks," he said adding that enquiries cannot be a basis as people have now become net savvy and can get all the details over the world wide web. "There is no need for most of them to visit the bank and it is only the final stages when they come for loan and that has fallen in the last few weeks. Where there were 15 forms about few weeks back filled confirming the loan, now it has become 10 forms," said the Reliance Capital official.