NEWPORT DUBBED "SUB-PRIME CAPITAL OF THE UK"

According to a survey in today's Financial Times Newport is the sub-prime capital of the United Kingdom. The survey concludes that more than one in 10 of the mortgages issued here have gone to homebuyers with a chequered credit history. The article quotes anecdotal evidence to confirm the findings of the study -

“It doesn’t surprise me that so many people in Newport are subprime,” said Tina Kingsbury, a mortgage adviser at Monmouthshire Independent Financial Advisers in central Newport. “Fifty per cent of my customers fall into that category. I’ve never dealt with people who have been bankrupt or anything like that. I get perfectly normal people coming in with adverse credit. Often they were out of work for a period of time, and then problems just built up from there.”