The Council of Mortgage Lenders (CML) has estimated that total gross lending in April was £16 billion, 1% down on the previous month and 4% lower than the £16.7 billion of lending last April.

Mohammad Jamei, CML economist, said: “Although lending in April was fractionally down on the previous month and year, this followed a stronger March. Overall, we now seem to be on the cusp of a modest lending recovery.

“Household finances are generally improving as earnings growth continues to outstrip inflation, and mortgages are being offered at extremely competitive rates. As a result, we expect to see stronger lending in future months.”

David Copland, TMA director, said: “We are now a third of the way through the year and gross advances are still lagging behind 2014 completions, albeit by c4%. The question is will the market pick up sufficiently enough to outperform last year as predicted by the CML themselves?

“The landscape looks encouraging. The election is behind us with the government holding a majority, anecdotal evidence that estate agents are getting busy, and the signal from the Bank of England that rates will rise in 2016 may galvanise existing homeowners eventually to consider remortgaging, 2015 has every chance of exceeding 2014’s, 205bn.”