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"We appointed a management consultant in May this year to review our procedures for processing land exchange and lease modification applications.

"After extensive consultations with the Lands Department, concerned government departments, prófessionals in the private practice and major property institutions, the consultants completed their study and submitted a report recommending a series of measures in mid-August.

"Most of the recommendations can be dealt with in-house and the issue of the Practice Note in October this year was the first step taken to speed up the processing procedures.

"As for those aspects which require additional resources, such as employment of consultants to verify costs that may be deductible from premium assessment and training on the application of computers to our work, we will discuss with the policy branches and other government departments on how they can be taken up," said Mr Pope.

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Residential mortgage survey results for November

Residential mortgage loans for the purchase of properties in Hong Kong continued to grow rapidly in November, according to the results of the latest monthly survey conducted by the Hong Kong Monetary Authority (HKMA).

The latest figures show that the total amount of outstanding mortgage lending by the 33 institutions in the survey rose by 1.8% in November (2% in October) to $319.9 billion. (The percentage change has been adjusted to allow for the reclassification of loans by an institution amounting to $0.4 billion during the month). The growth rate is higher than the monthly average of 1.5% over the last twelve months.

New loans approved during the month is the highest since the survey was first conducted in December 1992. However, the effect of this was offset by a corresponding increase in the amount of repayments which rose by 18.2% to $11.2 billion in November.

"These figures reflect the revival of refinancing of existing mortgages as well as demand for new mortgages arising from the continued buoyant residential property market in October," said the Acting Deputy Chief Executive of HKMA, Mr Raymond Li.

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