YORKSHIRE Building Society says it has made a strong start to the year despite lending being reduced and against a backdrop of economic challenges.
Reporting its results for the first half of 2023 today (Thursday, July 27), the company, which has its headquarters in Bradford, recorded £4.2 billion gross lending, which was a decrease from £5.3bn recorded in June 2022.
The society also helped 23,000 people to own a home with mortgage balances increasing to £45.9bn, compared to the December 2022 figure of £45.2bn.
The group posted growth in savings balances to £45.6bn, compared to £42.0bn in its December 31, 2022 figures, which it says was helped by the opening of 320,000 new savings accounts, compared to June 2022 with 171,000.
The society supported people to improve their financial well-being with three increases to variable savings rates in the first six months of the year, paying rates 1.04 percentage points higher than the market average (0.56 percentage points higher over 2022). The member-owned mutual achieved a pre-tax profit of £180.6m in the six months to June 30 this year (June 2022 was £243.4m) and delivered a core operating profit of £246.4m (June 2022 was £192.5m).
Susan Allen, chief executive officer at Yorkshire Building Society, said: “I’m delighted that these results, my first at the Society, demonstrate the strength and stability of our organisation.
“Against a backdrop of economic challenges, we’ve further improved the Society’s financial strength while delivering real help to our members and customers.
“Despite inflationary pressures and our continued investment to transform our business for the future increasing our costs, we’ve strengthened profitability, which as a mutual building society with no external shareholders, will be reinvested into the Society.
“After years of historically low savings rates, I’m pleased we’ve been at the forefront of giving back to savers as the rate landscape changed.
“So far this year we’ve passed on the majority of bank rate rises to our savings range, launched new loyalty savings accounts for members who have been with us a year or longer, and set rates that were on average 1.04 percentage points higher than the market average. This will go some way to supporting our members as they navigate the current cost-of-living challenges.
“While lending is down on the previous half year, this was expected in the context of the wider market. However, the volume of applications remained high, demonstrating the strength of our mortgage range to help people own a place to call home.”
