France 'remains stable' for property buyers

The French property market has retained a high level of stability due to the way French banks have gone about their lending policies, it has been stated.

Director of overseas mortgage brokers Conti Clare Nessling told the Independent that this has led to loans for buying homes being more readily available.

She remarked: "They [French banks] certainly haven't taken the extreme view that most UK lenders did. Throughout the credit crunch we've still been able to get 100 per cent mortgages in France for loans over EUR250,000 (GPB230,000)."

The paper reports that four-fifths of mortgages in the country are fixed, which the paper remarked may be another reason for the country's property market performing better than Britain's.

Evidence for this came from the French National Association of Real Estate Agents, whose figures stated that prices rose by 3.9 per cent in the second quarter of this year.

British buyers will make up 20 per cent of those purchasing French property in 2009, according to the country's leading mortgage lender BNP Paribas, the Daily Telegraph reports.

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