Banking entities have received some 7,000 requests for aid in the two months that have passed since the new rise in the Euribor came into force as a result of the war that began in Ukraine a year ago. Although, for the moment the banks have not clarified the data of how many loans they have modified.
According to financial sources consulted by EFE, in the middle of last week the volume of requests received by the big banks -Santander, BBVA, CaixaBank, Sabadell, Bankinter and Unicaja Banco- and by other entities exceeded 6,000, but that figure does not translate in aid granted.
inquiries and requests
It is, the same sources explain, queries and requests that in some cases fail if the client gives up receiving this type of aid when receiving detailed information on the different ways to alleviate their mortgage payment.
The difference between the requests received by the entities is very notable, since it depends on both the customer profile and the credit portfolio, in which variable mortgages may have a greater weight, which are becoming more expensive with the rise in the Euribor.
By way of example, only CaixaBank had received some 1,500 customer requests in mid-February, compared to the 33 requests that Bankinter had on the table. Other entities such as Santander or BBVA declined to reveal their data.
Some banks agree that the number of applications to date is “very low” and, although they assume that it will increase as the mortgages are reviewed and the Euribor increases are taken into account, they believe that the final number of beneficiaries will be very far from the million families that the Government anticipated.
different measures
At the end of November, the Government discovered a battery of mortgage relief measures that came into force in 2022 with the aim that one in three households with variable-rate mortgages could see their financial burden reduced.
In Spain, 3.7 million households have a variable-rate mortgage and the Executive calculated that more than a million of them would choose to reduce their installments with the approved measures.
For vulnerable families, the Code of Good Practices approved in 2012 was updated to give the option to restructure the mortgage with a lower interest rate during the 5-year principal grace period. The term to request a dation in payment was also extended to 2 years and the possibility of a second construction was added, if necessary.
In the case of middle-class families with liquidity problems, not solvency, the approved measures were for some 750,000 households with incomes of up to 29,400 euros per year, in which the mortgage has risen by at least 20% and consumes more 30% of your income.
Lastly, there were additional measures in which expenses and commissions were further reduced to facilitate the change from a variable rate to a fixed rate and the commissions for early repayment and change of mortgages from a variable to a fixed rate were eliminated throughout 2023.
