The national charity is warning people to think carefully before taking on additional borrowing, particularly if they already have a mortgage, and is pressing mortgage and secured loan lenders to ensure people can afford their repayments.
The survey showed that younger people are more likely to have missed a mortgage payment, with 13% of 21 to 24-year-olds surveyed saying they had missed one or more mortgage payments in the last 12 months.
In 2005 and 2006, local Citizens Advice Bureaus dealt with over 51,000 enquiries about mortgage and secured loan arrears and over 87,000 enquiries about actual or threatened homelessness.
The survey also found that many people do aspire to home ownership, but may not be in a position to afford to own their own home. Nineteen percent of people who rent, or around 2.6 million people, say they would like to own their own home but don’t anticipate ever being able to afford it.
If people are considering becoming homeowners they need to understand clearly what they are taking on. We don’t want people to borrow far more than they can afford. There is also a big responsibility on lenders of both mortgages and secured loans to take into account a person’s full financial commitments, and ensure that customers can afford repayments on any additional lending, said David Harker, chief executive of Citizens Advice.
