The Council of Mortgage Lenders (CML) has cut its forecast for the number of repossessions this year to 48,000.

Having anticipated 75,000 repossessions in 2009 in last year's housing market forecasts, the forecast had already been revised down to 65,000 in June, but is now being cut again in recognition of lender forbearance, government measures and the beneficial effect of continuing low interest rates which are helping most borrowers facing difficulty to keep their homes.

In the third quarter of this year, new CML figures show that the number and proportion of mortgages in arrears both fell, despite the bleak economic backdrop. At the end of September 194,600 mortgages, 1.77% of the total, were in arrears of 2.5% or more of the outstanding mortgage balance.

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This compares with 204,200 cases at the end of June.

Meanwhile 11,700 properties were taken into possession in the third quarter, up slightly from 11,400 in the previous quarter, and 5% higher than the number in the third quarter of 2008, but still lower than the 12,700 in the first quarter of the year. Around a quarter of the possessions in the third quarter of the year took place without a court order, very similar to the proportion in the previous quarter of the year.

CML Director General Michael Coogan said: "We are glad to have been wrong on our previous forecast for mortgage repossessions this year.

"Low interest rates, and lenders' forbearance policies, have helped to cushion many households facing financial problems. And although the economy is not out of the woods yet, we no longer expect a dramatic rise in properties being taken into possession unless interest rates rise from the low levels that most commentators now expect to persist for some time."

(CD/BMcC)