Mortgage Recomendations...

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I'm just in the process of re-mortgaging and wanted to know if any forum members have any recomendations?

Thanks:thumb:

I would go for 5 year fixed in these uncertain times and to lock in the current low rates. Northern Rock, Post office, Halifax worth a look.

Always ask for the APR which is the interest rate you will really be paying allowing for all the fees so many are sticking on customers. You will see 2.9% mortage (BUT somewhere it will say 4.6% APR or somesuch). Use the APR as the only fair way to compare them.
 
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I would go for 5 year fixed in these uncertain times and to lock in the current low rates. Northern Rock, Post office, Halifax worth a look.

Always ask for the APR which is the interest rate you will really be paying allowing for all the fees so many are sticking on customers. You will see 2.9% mortage (BUT somewhere it will say 4.6% APR or somesuch). Use the APR as the only fair way to compare them.

APR is less important for a mortgage.

APR is what you would pay over the lifetime of the mortgage, 25 years, however the reality is different. Most would move on after the deal is over and therefore make the APR irrelevant.
 
Thanks for all the advice so far, I'm going down the broker/IFA route.

Part of my problem is the age old 'what you declare to the taxman/what you need for a mortgage' dilemma.:rolleyes:

But, saying that, I should be seen as a poster boy for a mortgage; I've never missed a payment in 7 year and my credit rating is impeccable. Why is it this hard??:(
 
Might be a good idea to speak to your accountant and ask him to prepare a projection for the current tax year, a reasonable increase in profits could be acceptable to a lender.
 
Might be a good idea to speak to your accountant and ask him to prepare a projection for the current tax year, a reasonable increase in profits could be acceptable to a lender.

Possibly, but self employed applicants usually have to provide previous accounts to prove actual income.
 
For me, NatWest wanted to see 2 years of previous published accounts, but they did also take in to consideration a 6 month purchase order I showed them.
 
APR is less important for a mortgage.

APR is what you would pay over the lifetime of the mortgage, 25 years, however the reality is different. Most would move on after the deal is over and therefore make the APR irrelevant.

It is a lot more relevant than the rates they normally quote.
 
It is a lot more relevant than the rates they normally quote.

Actually it could well be the opposite to what you are saying.

When buying a car, for example, you will pay off the finance over a short length of time and representative APR is a valid measure because you will pay the same rate of interest over a short and pre-determined timescale.

A mortgage is different because you will typically buy severeral different products (and pay several different interest rates) over a much longer term.

To address your post specifically, the APR is most unlikely to be more relevant than 'the rates they normally quote' because very few buyers stay with the deal for the full term of the loan.
 
To address your post specifically, the APR is most unlikely to be more relevant than 'the rates they normally quote' because very few buyers stay with the deal for the full term of the loan.
And that problem is just as much a factor for the rates they quote. Worse, the shorter the time you keep the mortgage the more important are all the fees which they ignore in the rate they quote.
 
And that problem is just as much a factor for the rates they quote. Worse, the shorter the time you keep the mortgage the more important are all the fees which they ignore in the rate they quote.

I would grant most people the intelligence to spot the upfront fees, very few lenders charge a redemption penalty beyond the time of the deal.

APR has long been discredited as a reliable indicator for the way that mortgages are used currently, this is because they take into account a whole 25 year term and it is unlikely that most will stay with the same product that long.

For example some lenders currently have an SVR of 2.5% which makes their APR low as this is the rate used to calculate the remaining 20 years of your 5 year fixed rate.
Some have an SVR of 5% and more and their APR will be higher.
In neither scenario are customers obliged to remain on SVR for the remaining 20 years.
Some charge intrest daily, others annually - daily interest lowers APR and is, probably, the one thing that APR is useful for when comparing two apparently identical deals because the lower APR will be daily charging.

Finally, the APR is representative - this means that no one knows what SVR will actually be for the remaining 20 years further discrediting the APR calculation.
 
the sourcing systems that independent brokers use can be set to show true cost over say first 5 years of any mortgage.

It can therefore show true cost comparisons on the 'search results screen' of the various mortgage deals, shortlisted as possible deals for that particular client (with all the various fees and interest rates, redemptions fees etc included from each deal).

So, you can see true cost (to the penny for say first 5 years) for all the mortgage deals.

It is often surprising to the client to find that the deals with lower headline interest rate, can often be more expensive in real cash terms, because of various fees.
 
If anyone is interested below is link to a spreadsheet written by someone on the moneysavingexpert forum

My Excel mortgage spreadsheet - MoneySavingExpert.com Forums

You can enter in details of two mortgage products and it clearly shows all the costs on the month/year basis for simple comparison. You can also show the effects of overpayments etc. I found it quite useful.
 
amazin, just reading this thread.
You can see how the situation the economy is going. Loans on house of 1-3%.
inflation at 5% but on core items about 8-10%.

And business loans of around 14%.
Everything and anything to keep the ponzi scheme of house prices high.
The same muppets who got us into this situation have been given the power to get us out of it lol. All they are doing is making things worse.
I sit a watch how slowly the economy declining but all i see is 300k 3 bed semis, and the people living in there have never earned over 40k a year in there life.
Most not over 30k.
Might be a good idea to loads yourselves with debt, 300k will be what you buy your new C Class for in 10 years time.
 
I guess those 300k semis cost 100k when purchased, so did not need to earn
40k (or 30k if both partners were working)
 
Thanks for all the advice so far, I'm going down the broker/IFA route.

Part of my problem is the age old 'what you declare to the taxman/what you need for a mortgage' dilemma.:rolleyes:

But, saying that, I should be seen as a poster boy for a mortgage; I've never missed a payment in 7 year and my credit rating is impeccable. Why is it this hard??:(
It is not hard if you haven't been hiding income leaving those on PAYE to pay more in taxes:)
One of the costs of running two books ('one for self and one for taxman' as so many do) is that when mortgage time comes you want plenty of income; when tax time comes you want the opposite. It's the old cake and eat it problem. Self assessment allowed people to lie about their income and lead to the overblown property prices we now see. Thank goodness that has gone or nearly- let's hope for good.
 
It is not hard if you haven't been hiding income leaving those on PAYE to pay more in taxes:)
One of the costs of running two books ('one for self and one for taxman' as so many do) is that when mortgage time comes you want plenty of income; when tax time comes you want the opposite. It's the old cake and eat it problem. Self assessment allowed people to lie about their income and lead to the overblown property prices we now see. Thank goodness that has gone or nearly- let's hope for good.
He who casts the first stone.....

Amongst other things my biggest fault was buying a Nissan Navara 4ish year ago which, on paper, cost me £20k of earnings and because the banks are taking that year of income into account, it's brought my average down.

When I was contracting on the flood damaged properties, I was paying roughly £500 a week in tax aswell as NI, plus the tax i paid on the men working for me. This might be chicken feed to a lot of you but it burnt me to my soul that I was working 16 hour days to hand that amount over.

But I learned from that experience and now pay what the taxman requires me to. :)
 
Self assessment allowed people to lie about their income and lead to the overblown property prices we now see. Thank goodness that has gone or nearly- let's hope for good.

Latterly.

I was self employed in the early 90s and getting a self-certified mortgage involved a lower borrowing multiple and a certain amount of dilligence by the lender (stupidly OTT by my bank, more sensible by my Bsoc).

The situation went mad when it seemed to allow people on PAYE to go self-certified in order to break the rules in the early 2000s despite ever higher multiples.

There's a whole load of what are effectively sub-prime mortgages in the UK that are protected by the low base rates.
 
whatever you do, don't go to Skipton BS (includes what was Scarborough).

Their chief exec got blasted a year back for arbitrarily upping their standard rate when they were all being told to behave themselves - he gave the government two fingers & is still there to tell the tale.

They are also hopeless in terms of admin processes - really cocked mine up, lied to me, the IFA, my solicitor & ultimately the financial sevices ombudsman & that cost me real money.

Good luck though :thumb:
 
amazin, just reading this thread.
You can see how the situation the economy is going. Loans on house of 1-3%.
inflation at 5% but on core items about 8-10%.

And business loans of around 14%.
Everything and anything to keep the ponzi scheme of house prices high.
The same muppets who got us into this situation have been given the power to get us out of it lol. All they are doing is making things worse.
I sit a watch how slowly the economy declining but all i see is 300k 3 bed semis, and the people living in there have never earned over 40k a year in there life.
Most not over 30k.
Might be a good idea to loads yourselves with debt, 300k will be what you buy your new C Class for in 10 years time.

Average Salary in UK is £25,900. Based on the old fashioned 3.5 multiplier = a loan of £90,650. You don't find many properties in the North for this cost, never mind the South.

Then consider the deposits, of 5-10%, plus all the fee's. How many first time buyers can get into the market? The graph below is also telling.

Graphs > First time buyer average house price to earnings ratio - HousePriceCrash.co.uk

My own view is that house prices are still badly out of kilter with earnings. It's the greed of the middle aged to old aged home owner who, enabled by the banks have actually priced out the younger generation and now left themselves in limbo.

Who actually made money out of all this? In theory the home owner has, but it's all tied up in the property. Unless they have released some cash by remortgaging, in which case the bank is making more on the interest. Only such time as a homeowner downsizes would they see the benefit.

It's not a popular view, but I think values are still way out, and will come down. Politicians won't say it, as it's not a vote winner.

ETA - I did see a news article put out by the Building Federation a couple of weeks ago, saying buy quick as demand is overcoming supply. Such bull**** was refreshing to see!
 
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My own view is that house prices are still badly out of kilter with earnings. It's the greed of the middle aged to old aged home owner who, enabled by the banks have actually priced out the younger generation and now left themselves in limbo.

Rubbish.

Prices were boosted by two factors - demand and what people were prepared to pay.

If people had stopped conniving with the banks to 'break the rules' then the prices wouldn't have been boosted.

Instead an house price arms race took place. People felt they couldn't afford not to be on the ladder and the finance sector backed them to up the ante.

It wasn't helped by increased demand from other sources (buy to let and immigration) - which only needed a small % influence to move prices dramatically.

What was happening was blindingly obvious.

But instead of the financial sector and its customers reacting to the bubble by restricting risks the idiots blinded themselves to the obvious and started offerig 125% mortgages.

Some sort of enforcement of a reasonable multiple and a minimum deposit would have held things back to more reasonable levels.
 

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