The Association of Danish Mortgage Banks was formed in March 1972 following a merger of the former branch cooperation in the form of: " ”Kreditforeningernes Stående Fællesudvalg”, ”Hypotekforeningernes Stående Fællesudvalg” and ”Fællessekretariatet for de Obligationsudstedende Fonde og Finansieringsinstitutter.” The oldest committee, ”Kreditforeningernes Stående Fællesudvalg” was founded in 1887. The secretarial function was carried out by larger institutions in turn.
At the establishment of the Association of Danish Mortgage Banks, Erik Haunstrup Clemmensen, Kreditforeningen Danmark, was elected chairman.
The background for the establishment of the Association of Danish Mortgage Banks was the new mortgage loan law of June 1970, which created the basis for a merger wave that shortly reduced the number of mortgage banks from approx. 25 to 7 with Kreditforeningen Danmark (today Realkredit Danmark), Forenede Kreditforeninger (today Nykredit), Jyllands Kreditforening (today Nykredit), Byggeriets Realkreditfond (today BRFkredit) and Dansk Landbrugs Realkreditfond (today DLR Kredit) as the largest. With the new structure, there was a basis for establishing an association with an affiliated secretariat.
As part of the mortgage reform, the housing minister was authorized to lay down detailed rules for loan measurement and assessment. This necessitated supervision of the institutions complying with the new rules. The Association of Danish Mortgage Banks received that role and for a number of years, it was, therefore, a central part of public supervision of mortgage banks until the supervisory function in February 1981 was transferred to the Danish Housing Agency.
The Association of Danish Mortgage Banks was subsequently only an sectoral organisation and has since been working to maintain the core of the Danish mortgage model, which has provided homeowners and businesses with cheap and stable financing for more than 200 years.
Following the SDO legislation in spring 2007, Realkredit Danmark and Nordea Kredit resigned from the Association of Danish Mortgage Banks and established the Danish Mortgage Banks' Federation in order to safeguard their common political interests. Subsequently, LR Realkredit also left the Association of Danish Mortgage Banks and signed up to the Danish Mortgage Banks' Federation.
On December 22, 2016, the Association of Danish Mortgage Banks, the Danish Bankers Association and the Danish Mortgage Banks' Federation joined forces in one new joint branch organization, Finance Denmark. The Association of Danish Mortgage Banks continues as an association with its own board of directors, and all mortgage banks are thus still gathered under the Association of Danish Mortgage Banks.
