Mumbai, December 24: Public-sector lender, Bank of India (BoI) has joined the club of other banking majors like State Bank of India and ICICI Bank, to offer cheaper housing loans to borrowers.
The bank would offer 8 per cent fixed rate for home loans upto Rs 30 lakhs and 8.25 per cent for loans above Rs 30-lakh, for first two years, a BoI press release said here today.
The scheme–Star Own Your Home–is applicable for all new loans availed between January 1-February 28, 2010. After the two-year offer period, the lender will charge interest rate based on the prevailing floating rates.
BoI has also waived all processing charges to attract borrowers and has fixed the maximum amount that can be availed under the scheme as Rs 1.5 crore.
Other banks that have come with similar schemes include Kotak Mahindra Bank, IDBI Bank and home loan financier, Housing Development Finance Corporation.
IDBI Bank, which announced its special home loan scheme recently, is offering 8.25 per cent fixed rate for all its new loans till March 2012.
The bank had made this offer applicable for all new home-loan customers applying on or before March 31, 2010, and taking a part or full disbursement during the offer period.
Presently IDBI Bank is offering 8.75 per cent for loans up to Rs 30-lakh, 9 per cent for loans between Rs 30-lakh and up to Rs 50-lakh and 9.25 per cent for loans above Rs 50-lakh.
Early this month, ICICI Bank and Kotak Mahindra and home loan financier HDFC had announced special home loan schemes with fixed interest rate structure for a particular period, irrespective of the loan amount.
While ICICI Bank offered new home loans at a fixed rate of 8.25 per cent for the first two-years, irrespective of the loan amount, Kotak Mahindra Bank offered 8.49 per cent fixed interest for 30-months.
Country’s largest lender, State Bank of India set the ball rolling by announcing a scheme offering an 8 per cent interest rate early this year.
The scheme, earlier scheduled to end in November, was extended till March 2010, following a huge demand from the market.
—Agencies