The average rate for new home loans reached 3.59% in January 2024 according to the French Banking Federation, before beginning a gradual decline throughout the year. Over the specific duration of 25 years, the trajectory was even more volatile, with a peak higher than that of shorter durations and a widening spread gap between borrower profiles.
25-Year Duration Spread: What Bank Rates Reveal
The duration premium applied to 25-year loans compared to 20-year loans usually fluctuates between 10 and 20 basis points. In 2024, we observed a temporary widening of this gap in the first quarter, with some bank rate sheets displaying a differential of up to 30 basis points.
This tension is explained by the HCSF framework. The 25-year standard constitutes the maximum allowed duration (excluding exceptions for new purchases with deferrals), which concentrates the most strained debt-to-income ratio files on this maturity. Banks incorporate this statistical risk directly into their rate sheets.
Specifically, a borrower negotiating the rate of a 25-year mortgage must understand that the negotiation margin depends less on the macro context and more on their position in the lender’s internal scoring grid. A file with a high disposable income and a contribution exceeding 20% can obtain a rate close to that displayed for 20 years.
25-Year Mortgage Rates in 2024: Timeline of the Turnaround
At the end of 2023, Pretto documented an average rate for 25 years of 6.11% in December 2023. This level, the highest in over ten years, resulted from a monetary tightening cycle that had driven up 10-year OATs and interbank refinancing rates.
The first quarter of 2024 marked a plateau. Rates for 25 years remained high, with an average rate for new home loans (all durations) at 3.59% in January. The ECB had not yet begun to lower its key rates, and French banks were passing on the cost of their long-term funding.
The shift occurred in the second half of 2024. Several converging factors allowed for a relaxation:
- The first decrease in the ECB deposit rate, which mechanically reduced banks’ short-term refinancing costs, with a delayed effect on mortgage rates
- A renewed interbank competition driven by revised credit production targets to compensate for the low volumes of 2023
- A decline in 10-year OATs that eased the constraint on long fixed rates, including for the 25-year maturity
The decline was rapid: between the peak at the beginning of 2024 and stabilization in mid-2025, the average rate for 25 years lost more than two points. In May 2026, the FBF reported an average rate across all durations of 3.10%, and the rates for 25 years ranged from 3.20% to 3.42% according to CAFPI data from July 2026.
Usury Rate and 25-Year Loans: The Bottleneck of 2024
The usury rate played a major filtering role in 2024, particularly for long loans. The APR includes the nominal rate, borrower insurance, application fees, and guarantees. Over 25 years, the weight of insurance in the APR is proportionally higher than for 15 or 20 years, as the premiums run over a longer duration.
The result: technically solvent files found themselves blocked by the usury ceiling, even with an acceptable nominal rate. This phenomenon was particularly pronounced among borrowers over 45 years old, whose group insurance premiums often exceeded 0.35% of the borrowed capital per year.
The monthly calculation of the usury rate, implemented by the Banque de France, partially corrected this problem by allowing a more responsive adjustment of the ceilings. We systematically recommend delegating insurance on 25-year loans: reducing the cost of insurance by a few tenths of a point frees up an APR margin that can make the difference between an accepted file and a rejected one.
Borrower Profile and Rate Negotiation for 25 Years in 2024
Banks segment their 25-year rate sheets more finely than for shorter durations. The rate displayed on a barometer almost never corresponds to the rate actually offered to a given borrower.
Three variables weigh more heavily on the rate obtained than the market context:
- The amount of personal contribution relative to the property price: below 10%, the premium on 25 years can reach an additional 20 to 30 basis points compared to the standard rate sheet
- The domiciliation of income: banks offer their best rates in exchange for a domiciliation commitment, which turns the loan into a loss leader to capture household savings
- The disposable income after charges, which takes precedence over the debt-to-income ratio alone for files close to the HCSF ceiling of 35%
A gap of 40 to 80 basis points between the best negotiated rate and the market rate sheet emerges from CAFPI data from July 2026 (3.20% in the first decile versus 3.98% on the rate sheet). This gap confirms that individual negotiation remains the main lever for this duration.
The 25-year credit market in 2024 was characterized by a technical turnaround rather than a linear trend. Borrowers who signed in the first quarter bore the cost of the rising cycle, while those in the second half captured the initial decreases. By mid-2026, rates for 25 years oscillate around 3.4%, a level that remains high compared to the decade 2015-2021 but has restored the feasibility of many purchasing projects.