HSBC offered the cheapest mortgages in the country for the second year running according to a new league table.

Financial services researchers Defaqto said borrowers with HSBC paid £3,361.99 on a £50,000 mortgage, £532.39 cheaper than the most expensive deal from The Bank of Scotland.

Five building societies made it into the ten cheapest lenders, with Skipton Building Society and Nationwide coming second and third.

Halifax, Britain's largest lender was the 17 th cheapest of 29 lenders surveyed, with credit crunch victim Northern Rock 22 nd .

The Defaqto table measures standard variable rate mortgages for existing borrowers, and does not take into account special rates.

“While it is acknowledged that standard variable rate mortgages are only one type of mortgage,” said Defaqto's principal banking consultant David Black, “their importance may be increasing due to the knock-on effects of the credit crunch, making it more difficult to obtain attractive alternative deals.”