Housing Finance (HF) was the top residential mortgage lender in 2011, according to the Central Bank of Kenya’s second baseline residential mortgage survey.
According to the survey HF had 4,932 residential mortgage accounts as at December 31, 2011 valued at Sh25.8 billion – overtaking the Kenya Commercial Bank (KCB) which was ranked top in the first baseline residential mortgage survey.
Conducted in May 2010, the first baseline residential mortgage survey showed that HF had 3,988 mortgage accounts valued at Sh16.9 billion – placing it second after KCB which had 4,073 mortgage accounts valued at Sh18.1 billion.
This means the number of residential mortgage accounts and the value of mortgages held by HF between May 2010 and Dec 2011 rose by 24 per cent and 53 per cent respectively.
This impressive growth, said HF managing director Frank Ireri, is the result of ‘proper strategic planning and implementation.
“It is a culmination of our five-year strategy that we have been implementing,” Mr Ireri said adding that funds borrowed through a corporate bond in 2010 had cushioned the firm from rising interest rates on mortgages.
KCB however disputed the findings saying that its mortgage portfolio was understated in the report.
“KCB is basically the leader if you look at the entire mortgage sector. When doing the CBK reports it depends on what they asked for if they ask for residential mortgages they get exactly that,” Joram Kiarie, the KCB director for mortgages told Business Daily.
The bank’s annual report indicated that it held mortgage accounts worth Sh27.4 billion as at the end of last year.
Other top mortgage lenders, according to the CBK report, include CFC Stanbic, Standard Chartered, Barclays and Equity in that order.
