One in ten mortgagors have found it difficult to keep up with their payments over the last year, the government’s Household Resilience Study shows.

This compares to a rate of 4% reported in 2019 to 2020 and is in addition to the 2% of mortgagors who are currently in arrears (down from 6% in June to July of 2020 but higher than the pre-pandemic reading of 0.5%).

For both groups of borrowers, the most significant reason for finding payment difficult was having been put on furlough, at 28%, followed by working fewer hours or less overtime, at 25%. The third biggest reason was unemployment, which 17% of people stating this as their reason.

However, the statistics do show that fewer households have taken a mortgage holiday in recent months: in June to July 2020 this totalled 10%, in November to December 2020 this numbered 5%, and by April to May 2021 this had fallen to 3%.

The data adds that in 2019 to 2020, 59% of private renters and 28% of social renters expected to buy their own home “at some point in the future”.

This metric now equals 45% and 20%, respectively.