Applications for equity release rose 16% year-on-year and enquiries jumped 29% in the first half of 2026, building on the 11% growth recorded across all of 2025. More homeowners are actively exploring their options — here is what the data shows about how the market is developing.
Equity Release Supermarket, one of the larger intermediary businesses in the sector, reported a 16% year-on-year rise in applications and a 29% increase in enquiries in the first half of 2026. The enquiries figure matters as a leading indicator: it suggests the pipeline of homeowners actively considering these products is growing faster than the number who have already committed to applying.
This follows 11% growth across the full year of 2025, when total lending in the later-life market reached £2.57 billion. The consistent direction of growth — two consecutive years of double-digit expansion — reflects a gradual shift in how more homeowners are thinking about the equity they have built up in their property.
The lowest currently available lifetime mortgage rate is around 6.43% (MER), down approximately 0.20% from June. Rates in this market have moved within a relatively narrow band over the past twelve months rather than experiencing the sharp swings seen in the mainstream residential mortgage market. The slight easing this month is a modest positive for homeowners comparing their options, though rates remain higher than the historic lows seen in 2021 and 2022.
It is worth noting that the rate on a lifetime mortgage is only one component of how the total cost of the product is calculated — the compounding nature of interest over a potentially long period means that the effective cost depends significantly on how long the product runs and whether any repayments are made along the way.
Industry commentary points to several overlapping reasons for the steady growth in interest and applications. Rising property values over the past decade mean many homeowners aged 55 and over hold substantial equity relative to their income from pensions or savings — making property a natural part of their later-life financial picture. At the same time, more product variety within the market and a broader range of providers have expanded what is available, making it easier to find products that fit specific circumstances.
Greater general awareness also plays a role. Information about how equity release products work — including the protections built into modern products, such as the no-negative-equity guarantee — is more widely available than it was five or ten years ago. Homeowners are arriving at conversations about these products with a better baseline understanding, which tends to make the assessment process more straightforward.
Providers, intermediaries and lenders across the later-life lending sector met recently at an industry conference to discuss closer collaboration across the market. The discussion covered how different parts of the sector — equity release specialists, mainstream mortgage lenders offering retirement interest-only products, and later-life conveyancing — can work together more effectively to improve outcomes for homeowners. The drive towards greater sector-wide coordination is part of a broader effort to make the experience of exploring and completing later-life lending products smoother and more consistent.
“The growth in enquiries outpacing the growth in applications suggests homeowners are doing more research before they decide, which is a healthy pattern. Better-informed decisions tend to be decisions people are more comfortable with long-term.”
The fact that more homeowners are exploring equity release does not in itself make it the right choice for any particular individual. What the data does suggest is that these products are becoming a more mainstream part of later-life financial planning — less of an unusual or last-resort decision, and more of one option among several that homeowners in their 60s and 70s are actively considering alongside pension drawdown, downsizing, and other approaches.
If you are at the stage of wanting to understand how these products work before deciding whether they are relevant to you, the guides on this site are designed as a starting point: factual, plain-English information about how equity release works, what the different product types are, and what questions to consider before going further.
Want to understand how these products actually work before deciding anything? Read our plain-English guide to equity release.
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