In this review,we will recap for your benefit the important developments for the past week.

- The one percent fall recorded by Nationwide for February 2010 reverses a 10-month trend in rising house prices which had left prices at the end of 2009 is 5.9 percent higher than at the beginning of the year. This is bad news for homeowners but good news for the first time homebuyers. The Land Registry, which tracks all house prices and not just those with a mortgage (which is what Nationwide tracks) reported a 2.1 percent increase from December 2009 to February 2010 but this may just be the after-effects of the December rush before the stamp duty concessions were removed. Read on…………

-  The practice of cross selling is not new in banking where banks attempt to sell a package of products and services. But the specific practice of linking mortgages to the products such as current accounts is a growing trend and is likely to pose a threat to mortgage brokers by appealing in directly to the homebuyer. An increasing number of lenders are now offering packaged mortgage deals where they hook the customer with the mortgage in the hope that they can sell him a whole range of products Read on……..

- Lord Turner, Chairman of the Financial Services Authority, told the Treasury committee that mortgage rates would have to be higher to avoid future financial crisis. He said that the credit crisis had partly been precipitated by the easy availability of cheap credit and said that there was a “trade-off between financial stability and credit”. He said that history was likely to repeat itself and that there was a need to “to place as many guards   as possible”. This would operate them by controlling lending to some sectors of the economy and not across-the-board. This could include new loan to value limits for some kinds of mortgages. Read on…..

- Post Office mortgage has said that millions of borrowers could be paying over the odds because they do not know where their SVR (standard variable rate) stands. Despite the Bank of England rate standing at a record low of 0.5 percent, many lenders have significantly raised their SVR and homeowners should not assume that they are getting the best possible deal."If you're thinking about switching mortgage, now is the best time to do it, before rates rise further," said Post Office personal lending director Marco Hughes .Read on…..

- For the 12th consecutive month, the Bank of England has voted to keep the base rate at the all-time low of 0.5 percent. Experts say that this is good news for mortgage borrowers who will see continued reductions in mortgage interest rates. Ray Boulger of the independent mortgage advisory firm John Charcol says that with the easing of the economic situation, decisions like base rate will be 'all about the politics'. He expects the outcome of the next general election to have a significant effect on mortgage rates.Read on………

- With Halifax announcing a dip of 1.5 percent in house prices between January and February 2010 and the continued slowness of the economic recovery, the housing market scene is all set for a "double dip". The announcement from the Halifax followed the one percent dip announced by the Nationwide and is bad news for homeowners. It increasingly appears that the dip is more fundamental than merely a correction of the December boom.Read on…….

News brought to you by Mortgage ComparisonSpecialists The Mortgage Finders