Argentina mortgages fall 47% as home sales hold up
Argentina’s mortgage market cooled sharply in the first seven months of 2026, with new loan openings falling 47% from a year earlier even as home sales held up, underscoring how higher rates, stricter underwriting and weak long-term bank funding are squeezing access to housing finance.
Between January and July, 13,329 new mortgages were recorded and estimated, down from 25,160 in the same period of 2025, according to Tejido Urbano’s Mortgage Credit Monitor. The slowdown matters because mortgages are one of the few channels that can turn pent-up housing demand into actual transactions in an economy where inflation, short maturities and thin credit markets have long kept homeownership out of reach for many households.
The weakness is most visible in financed deals, not in the broader property market. In Buenos Aires province, mortgage-backed deeds fell 32.6% in the first half to 6,913, while in Buenos Aires city they dropped 37.2% to 4,152. Overall deed activity was far more resilient, down just 7.8% in the province and 0.2% in the capital, suggesting buyers are still active but increasingly unable to close with bank financing.
At the same time, the amount of money flowing through the market has stayed high because borrowers who do qualify are taking larger loans. About $905 million moved through the mortgage market in the first half, roughly the same as all of 2024, even as the number of loans shrank. Average mortgage rates rose from 6.66% in April to 7.02% in June, while average loan terms slipped from 24.7 years to 23 years, raising the income threshold for borrowers and narrowing the pool to higher-earning households.
That is why the market is cooling without collapsing. Demand for housing has not disappeared, but the first wave of buyers that rushed in after the 2024 relaunch and 2025 rebound is fading, while bank credit standards are tightening and property prices are leaving larger down payments in dollars. For investors, the mix points to slower transaction volumes, more selective lending and a mortgage market that remains too small to become a broad growth engine for real estate or bank balance sheets.
The government is trying to revive the pipeline by using the FGS guarantee fund to channel longer-dated money into banks. Thirteen financial institutions received funding that must be deployed in mortgages capped at UVA plus 7.5% with minimum 15-year terms, a program officials say could support 17,000 to 18,000 new loans, with initial offers expected between October and November.
Even so, the structural constraints remain. Banks still fund themselves mostly with short-term deposits while lending for 15 to 30 years, and the current plan is capped at a little over 2 trillion pesos, meaning it can help but not create a permanent mortgage market. Unless Argentina develops deeper long-term funding, securitization and faster underwriting, housing credit is likely to remain episodic rather than mass-market.
| Entity | Gains | Losses |
|---|---|---|
| Banks with FGS funding | ▲Longer-dated funding | ▼Balance-sheet mismatch pressure |
| Qualified higher-income borrowers | ▲Access to mortgages | ▼Smaller borrower pool competition |
| Government | ▲Near-term credit support | ▼Limited, capped policy fix |
| Home sellers / real estate market | ▲Deal support from credit rebound | ▼Slower financed sales |