With the Lemoine law, which entered into force on June 1 for new loans, those who borrow less than 200,000 euros are no longer subject to a health questionnaire to ensure their credit, provided that the total repayment is made before the age of 60 . For people who are sick or have been sick recently, “you go from the impossible to the possible,” says Kévin Spreux, development director of Prelys Courtage, the company that accompanied Emma.
General increase
During her first attempt, she had to submit a health questionnaire because the credit over 25 years took her more than 60 years. As expected, his case was dismissed. The fact that she has been in remission since 2020 has not changed anything: “We hold a cancer brand”, notes Emma, ​​for whom the Lemoine law allows “to restore a little justice”. By reducing the loan period from 25 to 23 years, she was able to stay within the framework provided by the legislation and get her loan.
Like her, many people have taken up this change in legislation to try to get better insurance, Prelys Courtage testifies. However, by insuring people who were previously excluded or whose cases were accepted on payment of an additional premium, insurers are taking on a risk that they consider difficult to quantify. This can “create an unexpected effect for people who know they are going to die,” the head of a mutual insurance company cynically summarized to reporters.
If some insurers have promised not to raise their prices, such as CNP Assurances, a subsidiary of La Banque Postale group and leader in this market, or even to lower them for young people, such as Crédit Agricole, number two in borrower insurance, c is far from the case for everyone. The number of bonuses has increased. In what proportions? According to a study by the company Vertone, which compared 1,700 rates from non-bank insurance companies, before and after the adoption of the law, rates for borrowers who escape the health questionnaire increased by 49% on average, with very large differences.
General increase
Olivier Le Gallo, managing director of the online broker Magnolia.fr, estimates for his part that this increase was more around 20%. The new provisions of the law, such as the shortening of the period of the right to be forgotten, which exempts from declaring certain diseases five years after the end of therapeutic protocols against ten years previously, are “social progress, but which have a price”, he states . Another change in the law with strong consequences: the possibility to change the insurance company at any time and no longer only during the first year and then on the anniversary of the signing of the contract.
At Magnolia.fr there was “a pretty incredible explosion of requests” with calls tripling during the first week of September as soon as the new legislation applied to old loans, according to Olivier Le Gallo. Borrower insurance is a market that is approximately 85% owned by banks, which make significant margins to the detriment of borrowers’ purchasing power, condemning for several years consumer associations and insurance companies themselves.
