Mortgage searches jumped in May despite the month including an extra bank holiday, due to the Coronation of King Charles III, says Twenty7tec.  

The search engine business says home loan searches were up 7.9% last month compared to April, remortgage searches lifted 11.1%, and buy-to-let searches rose 7.7% over the same period.  

It adds that broker searches for first-time buyer products were up 7.7%, while May was the second busiest ever month for self-employed mortgage searches.  

May included three bank holidays, instead of the usual two, due to the Royal event.  

However, at the end of May, the number of products on the platform fell by 8.3% to 15,609, its largest month-on-month decline since last autumn.  

The firm ads that two-year fixed mortgages accounted for 42.76% of all fixed product searches, compared to just 22.37% a year ago.  

While five- to ten-year fixed mortgages now account for 24.13%, compared to 36.12% last May.  

Twenty7tec director Nathan Reilly says: “May was characterised by its strong performance despite its unusual tally of three bank holidays.   

“Some of the drop in activity that we experienced in April was recovered, but we’re expecting a bank-holiday-free, pre-summer holiday June to see activity rise even further.

“Although it will be interesting to see if this front-end activity translates through to applications after last week’s economic update and the impacts this has had on interest rates.   

He adds: “The rate decision by the Bank of England will almost certainly mean that we’ll see a rise in mortgage searches just before and just after 22 June.  

“While product numbers are largely down due to last week’s inflation update and lenders taking stock, the market is still in a far better position than post-mini-Budget as availability remains broadly consistent across all areas.”  

“The move in fixed mortgages has definitely swung back towards the two-year products which now account for the same proportion of the market as they did two years ago.   

“It will be interesting to see whether this theme continues. It seems customers are favouring some level of certainty rather than trying to predict the market and roll the dice on the long-term future of base rate.”