DESPITE falling house prices, over-65-year-olds still hold equity worth £611.5bn in their homes, says Prudential’s latest Equity Release Index, but the average over-65-year-old saw the value of equity in their home fall by £21,377 between October last year and January, this year.

About 42.5 per cent of this equity is in London and the South-East. London homeowners lost an average £38,057 in the final quarter of last year, the loss was only £13,028 in Yorkshire and Humberside.

● Best performing Cash ISA in the 2008-9 tax year was the Alliance & Leicester premier ISA, which turned a maximum £3,600 invested on April 6, last year into £3,927.37 by April 5, this year, says Money facts.co.uk. All the top performers were fixed rate ISAs.

Cash ISAs pay an average 1.94 per cent, against 0.65 per cent on a no-notice account.

● The choice of mortgages is getting wider – Alliance & Leicester says its two-year tracker at base rate plus 2.45 per cent (currently 2.95 per cent) is a best buy with a £499 fee and Loan-to-Value limit of 75 per cent. It is available to buyers and remortgagers up to £250,000.

● Credit card holders should look at charges on cash withdrawals, says price comparison service uSwitch.com. Its figures suggest credit card consumers make 38 million withdrawals a year, racking up £161m in interest charges.