Over the 1o-year period ending in 1972 the value of residential mortgage debt outstanding doubled from $211.2 billion to $422.5 billion. Chart 1 shows how the suppliers of mortgage credit participated in this growth. During the first five years, the relative degrees of participation was roughly unchanged; but during the second five years savings and loan associations, commercial banks, and “others” (several Federal agencies and individuals) increased their market shares at the expense of mutual savings banks and life insurance companies.
These shifts in market shares may in part be explained by the data in chart 2, which shows residential mortgages as a percentage of total assets at four financial institutions. Over the period, savings and loan associations held essentially fixed proportions of their total assets in residential mortgages. Mutual savings banks and life insurance companies, however, reduced their relative holdings of residential mortgages, especially after 1969, in favor of alternative assets. Chart 3 shows net savings inflows at three depository institutions. In 1971 and 1972 commercial banks and savings and loan associations en- joyed unusually large savings inflows, which they in part used to enlarge their shares of the residential mortgage market.