Some lenders have been aggressive, but overall we now feel that the main banks have been too slow to organise themselves sufficiently for the very large and complex task of engagement with delinquent borrowers with a view to getting their mortgage book back into performance, with realistic loan modifications where – and only where – necessary, and not shying away from foreclosures in the BTL segment in cases where this proves inevitable.
This, of course, poses a potential threat to a currency union with the aim of a stable price level. Second, an institutional problem is the indirect result of these developments. The intellectual architects of the euro area assumed the member states of the currency area were basically the same who constituted the European Union.