There is a ticking time bomb in the U.K. mortgage market. Back before the credit crunch, when it seemed inevitable that house prices would continue to rise at pace forever, large numbers of borrowers turned to interest-only mortgages. It made borrowing cheaper after all, and when the time came to repay the capital they owed, they could simply sell the house and still enjoy a tidy profit. According to the FCA there are currently 1.67 million full interest-only and part capital repayment mortgage accounts outstanding in the U.K., representing almost 17% of all outstanding mortgage accounts. As the regulator noted, to date the attempts at communication have focused on merely writing to interest-only borrowers, but evidently it is rather easy to ignore those letters.

Source: Forbes January 30, 2018 19:52 UTC