New Home Loans in Portugal Cost 3.06 Percent After a Sixth Monthly Increase, as New Term Deposits Jump to 1.82 Percent

Taking out a home loan in Portugal kept getting dearer in September. The average interest rate on new housing loans rose for a sixth month in a row, to 3.06 percent, according to Banco de Portugal (Bank of Portugal) figures released today. That is up from 3.01 percent in August and 2.81 percent in March, when the rate was at its low for the year. Savers saw the other side of the same trend: the rate paid on new term deposits rose for an eighth month, and jumped from 1.63 to 1.82 percent.

The figures are in the Bank of Portugal's statistics portal, BPstat. They cover loans and deposits signed during the month. This is a different number from the rates on mortgages already running, which follow the Euribor (the euro interbank rate most Portuguese loans are pegged to) and reset at each review. We covered those resets in November's Euribor update.

What a new borrower pays

The 3.06 percent average includes renegotiated loans, which the Bank of Portugal counts as new operations. On our own arithmetic, a 150,000 euro loan over 30 years at 3.06 percent costs about 637 euros a month. At March's 2.81 percent it would have cost about 617 euros: some 20 euros a month more, or roughly 240 euros a year, before fees and insurance.

Those extras matter. The TAEG (the annual percentage rate of charge, which adds fees and other costs to the interest) on new housing contracts, excluding renegotiations, was 5.21 percent in September, up from 4.78 percent in March.

Banks lent 2,759 million euros in new housing loans in September, including renegotiations, against 2,643 million in August and 2,595 million a year earlier. For loans on a permanent home, renegotiations made up about 21 percent of the month's new lending.

Mixed rates now dominate

Most new borrowers now take a mixed rate (taxa mista), fixed for the first years and then variable. For loans on a permanent home, mixed-rate contracts made up 85.6 percent of new lending in September, against 69.9 percent in September 2025. Variable-rate loans fell to 11.6 percent of new lending, from 26.1 percent a year earlier, and fully fixed loans were 2.8 percent.

Mixed rates were also the cheapest of the three: 2.92 percent on average in September, against 3.30 percent on variable-rate loans and 3.90 percent on fixed-rate loans.

What savers get

The 1.82 percent average on new term deposits (depósitos a prazo) for households compares with 1.34 percent in January. On our arithmetic, 10,000 euros placed for a year at September's average would earn about 182 euros before tax, against 134 euros at January's rate.

Across the euro area, banks paid 2.37 percent on new household term deposits in September and charged 3.62 percent on new housing loans, so Portuguese borrowers pay less than the euro area average while Portuguese savers also earn less.

What it means for you

• Buying a home: the average is only a benchmark. Ask several banks for an offer and compare the TAEG, not just the headline rate, because fees and required insurance can add more than the gap between two banks' rates.
• Choosing a rate type: a mixed rate is cheaper today, but check how long the fixed period lasts and which Euribor the loan follows once it ends.
• Saving: rates on new deposits are rising, so an older deposit renewing automatically may be paying less than a new one. Compare before it rolls over.

Our earlier report compared August's deposit rates across Europe.