First time buying held the top spot as the most popular advice category, accounting for an average of 40% of consumer enquiries for the whole year. The second most popular advice category was remortgaging, with an average of 32% of searches being made in this area in 2009. Across the year there was a spike in consumer mortgage enquiries in the first three quarters, when competitive mortgage deals were hard to come by, and enquiries stablised in the final quarter as the housing market has shown signs of recovery.
Karen Barrett, chief executive of Unbiased.co.uk, commented: "2009 was undoubtedly a volatile year, but it is encouraging to see that when there is turbulence in the housing market consumers seek advice from the experts - as demonstrated from our Advice Driver statistics. However, it is essential that consumers continue to seek advice regardless of the state of the property market, to ensure they are making the best decisions for their individual circumstances.”
Top Ten Mortgage Advice Drivers: 2009
First time buyers: 40% of the requests
Remortgages: 32%
Residential mortgages: 21%
Buy-to-let: 12%
Equity release: 7%
Sub-prime: 7%
Self employed: 5%
High loan to value: 3%
Flexible: 3%
Commercial: 2%
