In August, the average amount financed in mortgage credit in Portugal was 204,359 euros, according to data from the ComparaJá portal. However, this number results from the mixture of two very different products. When disaggregated, an acquisition loan financed on average 238,933 euros, while a bank transfer loan financed only 155,434 euros, a difference of 83,499 euros.
The explanation for this disparity lies in the nature of each operation. An acquisition loan finances the current price of a house, while a transfer finances what remains of an old loan, already partially amortized. That is, the first number reflects the current real estate market and the second measures the past.
In August, the weight of transfers fell from 44.4% to 39.8% of operations, while acquisitions rose to 54.6%. Despite this proportional increase in larger operations, the national average amount declined slightly, from 204,713 to 204,359 euros. This happened because the average value of transfers themselves fell 13% in a single month, from 178,712 to 155,434 euros, indicating that the transfer market is exhausting contracts with higher capital outstanding.
The conclusion of the article is that the aggregate average serves to track total credit volume, but is misleading for any other analysis. Anyone who wants to know how much it costs to buy a house today should look at the value of acquisitions, and anyone who wants to assess the state of renegotiations should look at transfers. When the components of an average move in opposite directions, the apparent stability is an illusion.
