Housing boom in go-slow 

The credit crunch has started to hit the buy-to-let housing boom, a survey reveals today.

The Royal Institution of Chartered Surveyors (RICS) said the number of new instructions from landlords fell towards the end of 2007, for the first time since 1998.

RICS blamed recent restrictions on mortgage lending to would-be landlords.

"The credit crunch has restricted the number of buy-to-let mortgages approved, as well as the number of mortgages available to investors," RICS said.

The findings appeared to contradict recent figures from mortgage lenders, which suggested the buy-to-let market was thriving.

Last month the Council of Mortgage Lenders reported that the number of buy-to-let loans had gone up by nearly quarter last year, taking the number of such mortgages in existence to 1,038,000.