Spain 
Italy 
Greece 
Mortgage Payments Fall by 50% in Nine Years
8 January 2018
An individual who borrowed funds from a bank to buy a home has seen their monthly mortgage payments go down, due to a decrease in Euribor rates, the benchmark interest rate to which many loans are linked in Portugal. In the past nine years, the average monthly payment has dropped by half.
According to the Correio da Manhã, which studied accounts that were drawn up by Deco, a family that contracted a 30-year, 150,000-euro loan in September 2008, with a spread of 1%, initially paid a monthly instalment of 920.55 euros. Nine years later, in December 2017, the same type of loan would require a monthly pay-out of just 464.01 euros – down 456.54 euros.
The decrease reflects a fall in the six-month Euribor interest rate, the index most commonly used with Portuguese home loans. Euribor rates reached a peak in September 2008 and fell to a low in December of last year.
This scenario should change, however, later this year. Interest rates are expected to begin rising in the second semester of 2018, the publication reported.
Original Story: idealista
Translation: Richard Turner