Net mortgage borrowing in October came to £1.6bn, shows new stats from the Bank of England (BoE), significantly lower than the £9.3bn recorded in September and the lowest amount recorded since July 2021.

The BoE states that this fall was driven by borrowing “brought forward to September to take advantage of stamp duty relief before it was completely tapered off”.

Gross lending fell from £30.7bn in September to £19.3bn in October.

Meanwhile, house purchase approvals also dropped, from 71,900 to 67,200 on a monthly basis, while the value of these came to £14.6bn in October.

Approvals for remortgaging moved in the opposite direction by a small amount, totalling 41,600 at a value of £8.7bn. This, says the BoE, is the highest number of remortgage approvals seen since March 2020.

North London estate agent and former Rics residential chairman Jeremy Leaf says: “These figures are interesting because they demonstrate a tipping point for the property market as the impact of the stamp duty holiday and the number of brought forward purchases was laid bare.

Nevertheless, we have found at the sharp end there are still many trying to take advantage of low interest rates before their seemingly inevitable increase and buy houses rather than flats, which are still lagging in the popularity stakes, particularly those without outside space.

“We don’t see too much change, although we are expecting the bounce back in listings between December and January to be stronger than usual as buyers and sellers come to terms with the new normal.”

And Phoebus Software sales and marketing director Richard Pike comments: “The problem for the market at the moment doesn’t appear to be appetite, it is rather one of supply.

“With Propertymark reporting an average of 24 buyers per home on the market it is becoming almost untenable. Add to that the fact that we are not building the number of homes we should be and the supply problem is, as ever, a huge stumbling block to the long-term health of the housing market.

“Nevertheless, the fact that the prospect of rising interest rates is not discouraging people from looking for a new home, is encouraging in itself.

“It will be interesting to see whether current appetite continues in the face of potential further coronavirus measures as the government assesses the threat from this new variant.”