Wedding loans among youth see 11% rise during the second wave: report

NEW DELHI: Demand for wedding loans was the highest among all categories at 33% during the second wave of the covid-19 pandemic compared with 22% during the first wave, according to a study conducted by IndiaLends, a digital lending platform, among the people aged between 20-35 years.

According to the digital lending platform, this surge in applications for wedding loans was due to a year-long delay in their wedding plans brought about by the pandemic.

Likewise, business loans too saw an increase from 16% to 23% during the second wave. Notably, loans for household purposes saw a dip from 40% to 24% during the same period.

IndiaLends conducted the study on loan trends among young Indians on the occasion of International Youth Day.

The study was conducted among both salaried and self-employed young Indians across nine major cities—Mumbai, New Delhi, Bengaluru, Hyderabad, Chennai, Kolkata, Jaipur, Ahmedabad and Pune during August 2020 to March 2021 and April 2021 to July 2021.

A total of 11,000 respondents were evaluated for their loan requirements in nine main categories, namely wedding, business, education, travel, household, medical, two-wheeler and debt consolidation.

“We are thrilled to see continuous shift among youth behaviour and mindset during the last 17 months of the pandemic. India’s youth have proven to be adaptative with the changing circumstances. They are now better prepared to meet their financial needs and are gradually imbibing financial discipline. Their adaptability quotient gets them ahead of their previous generation,” said Gaurav Chopra, founder and CEO, IndiaLends.

The survey also found that 10% of applications for both weddings as well as for business purposes were received from women borrowers.

Meanwhile, loan applications for household expenditure saw a dip during in the second wave, suggesting that that youth are now better prepared to meet financial needs.

The average ticket-size of loans for wedding was ₹4.13 lakh, followed by medical expenses ₹4 lakh, household expenses ₹3.43 lakh and for business ₹2.62 lakh.

IndiaLends received about 56% of loan applications from tier-2 cities both during the first and the second wave of the pandemic.

“Among others, applications for the purpose of education, car & two-wheeler loans, travel loans etc. were almost similar both in the first and the second waves. Applications for medical loans did witness a little spike in the second wave owing to the severity of the situation and the impact it had on the health of most of the population,” the lending platform said in a release.