Consumers who want to borrow money because they want to buy a car, for example, are increasingly expensive. This is because banks charge increasingly higher interest rates for personal loans, reports comparison site Geld.nl, which keeps track of the interest rates of fourteen lenders.
The lowest interest rate is 4.1 percent and that applies to a loan of at least 50,000 euros. According to Amanda Bulthuis of the comparison site, it is the first time in four years that the lowest interest rate has been above 4 percent. For the sake of clarity: mortgage interest rates are not included in this overview.
Freo and Nationale-Nederlanden, among others, raised their interest rates on Wednesday. They did not do this for the first time: interest rates for personal loans have been rising since the beginning of this year. This is because banks and other lenders themselves also lose more money when they borrow money. And they pass these extra costs on to their customers, for example if they take out a personal credit.
Bulthuis thinks that interest rates may soon fall slightly, because the interest rates that banks have to pay themselves also fell very recently.
At the same time, there is a possibility that interest rates will actually rise, because the European Central Bank (ECB) is likely to raise its interest rates on Thursday. This leads to higher costs at banks and other lenders, which may also increase their own interest rates in the near future.
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