In the first nine months of this year, €2.8 billion was taken out in order to acquire property, up from €2.3 billion loaned last year and the €1.9 billion registered in the same period of 2012.


However, while this recovery continues to pick up speed, the current level of mortgage lending remains far below the peaks registered during the pre-troika reality with the bailout year of 2011 itself seeing some €4.9 billion dished out to fund property purchases.


With the writing already on the door, this figure itself was sharply down on the mortgage backed property splurges previously ongoing with 2010 and 2009 both seeing €9.3 billion in mortgage lending, down from the 2008 peak of €13.3 billion.


There have been corresponding fluctuations in the total of mortgage loans outstanding with September 2015 seeing the banks holding a mortgage portfolio worth €99.5 billion, down €3.3 billion year-on-year.


This total of outstanding mortgage loans had peaked in March 2011 at €114.5 billion and hence September 2015 saw this figure fall some €14.9 billion below that amount with some 2.1 million outstanding mortgages of which 90% have variable interest rates with the Euribor six-month rate applied to around two-thirds of such loans.


The Bank of Portugal also stated that mortgage lending represented 82% of the loans made with around 2.5% of mortgages subject to default or similar delays in repayment.