Finance Choices
Should you be a mortgage tart?
I wrote an article last week explaining how so called credit tarts (people who exploit 0% introductory offers before moving on) were exploiting the credit card industry and now it seems that more of you should be adopting a similar approach to your mortgage.
Seven million Britons have not changed their mortgage since John Major was the Prime Minister, new data has revealed.
And this group of people could save as much as £5 billion a year, or more than £750 each, by swapping to market leading rates, mortgage broker Charcol has revealed.
Perhaps more surprisingly, there are 2.4 million homeowners who have not changed their mortgage since Margaret Thatcher was in power and interest rates were 13.9 per cent.
"Millions of homeowners are missing out on potentially massive repayment savings by sitting on their hands instead of taking advantage of today's low rates," said Elliot Nathan of Charcol.
"A typical borrower on standard variable rate can save around £120 per month by remortgaging, and you can quickly check online or over the phone whether this applies to you," he added.
Since Tony Blair came to office more people have remortgaged than under any other Prime Minister, Charcol revealed, but remortgaging per year peaked during the Tory-led period between 1989 and 1993, as interest rates climbed to 15 per cent in 1990, then fell to 5.4 per cent.
Mr Nathan concluded: "There may be a general feeling of apathy over the election on May 5, but there's simply no excuse for apathy over one of the biggest financial commitments of your life."
So there you are. If you want to make the most of your mortgages it helps to shop around so that you get the best deal possible. Have a look at the mortgage offerings of Promise Finance.
Until next time,
BW
Seven million Britons have not changed their mortgage since John Major was the Prime Minister, new data has revealed.
And this group of people could save as much as £5 billion a year, or more than £750 each, by swapping to market leading rates, mortgage broker Charcol has revealed.
Perhaps more surprisingly, there are 2.4 million homeowners who have not changed their mortgage since Margaret Thatcher was in power and interest rates were 13.9 per cent.
"Millions of homeowners are missing out on potentially massive repayment savings by sitting on their hands instead of taking advantage of today's low rates," said Elliot Nathan of Charcol.
"A typical borrower on standard variable rate can save around £120 per month by remortgaging, and you can quickly check online or over the phone whether this applies to you," he added.
Since Tony Blair came to office more people have remortgaged than under any other Prime Minister, Charcol revealed, but remortgaging per year peaked during the Tory-led period between 1989 and 1993, as interest rates climbed to 15 per cent in 1990, then fell to 5.4 per cent.
Mr Nathan concluded: "There may be a general feeling of apathy over the election on May 5, but there's simply no excuse for apathy over one of the biggest financial commitments of your life."
So there you are. If you want to make the most of your mortgages it helps to shop around so that you get the best deal possible. Have a look at the mortgage offerings of Promise Finance.
Until next time,
BW
posted by Bruce Wayne at 12:50 PM
Should you be a mortgage tart?
3 Comments:
Hi all
A few questions about remortgaging as our fixed rate period runs out in a few months time, and want to start looking at options...
1 - how far in advance do we need to talk to existing lender.
2 - how long does the approval process take? vaguely remember from before that is was less than a couple of months. Is it quicker or slower when remortgaging?
3 - how does the process work? What paperwork required etc? Also, does this vary dependant on whether you change lender or stay with the same one?
We don't need to extend the mortgage at all, just changing at the end of our fixed period. Preference is to stay with existing lender if deal is good enough.
Final question, any really good deals out there at the mo?
Any advice appreciated.
Thanks.
1 - I'd recommend you start talking to your existing lender and looking around at other lenders about three months before your current deal ends. This then gives you plenty of time to take either option.
2 - Remortgages, especially if you're not looking to borrow any additional funds, should be quicker than home purchase applications. You may be able to get the whole thing approved within a fortnight, and depending on how smoky your legal representative is (and whether they use things like Title Insurance) you may be able to get the whole thing done in a month. Nevertheless, it's worth applying in advance of this - you can always delay completion until you need it.
3 - If you stay with your existing lender, I would suspect that the process is relatively straightforward - you may need to sign some forms but it would not be as onerous as a full application. You certainly won't need another valuation, for instance. If you remortgage to another lender, then your into "full application" territory, but these days most lenders are relatively switched on and will want to make this as painless as possible for you - they want your business after all!
Are there any good deals out there? Yes - loads! Seriously, have a look at the articles on this site as a first step.
Cheers
Babs
I can vouch for trying to get a good deal now as my current mortgage provider has just cost me £1500.
I sold my house last year but it fell through. At the time Bradford & Bingley(my current provider) found me a deal with A&L which was 5.99% fixed for 2 years with no arrangement fee, free valuation and a lovely £1750 cash back.
Needless to say the morgage expired with A&L in November and i lost out on this offer.
I resold in January and wanted to get a morgage aranged quickly while the rates were good and the cashbacks were available but our advisor at B&B refused to make us an appointment until our buyers had had the survey done on our house. She said there was no point in doing all the paperwork again and then the sale falling through and said that we should wait to see more of a commitment from our buyers. However she told me about current deals and said the best she could get was again with alliance & leicester @ a rate of 4.99%, no arrangement fee, free valuation and £1250 cashback(apparently the % of cashback had fallen)
I would of been happy to of gone for that deal and after discussnig it with hubby rang her to make an appointment but she still said there was no point in us coming in as rates were changing all the time and we were no further along with our buyers.
I am so annoyed with her now because her refusal to see us has cost us dearly. The cashback deal has ended and now the best deal is a 2yr 4.39% fixed deal with A&L which has no cashback and an arrangement fee of £499.
I know the rate is better but for us on a 44k mortgage the other deal would of saved us a packet.
I really don't want to get my mortgage through B&B now but we are tied in until April 2007 and they will only waive the redemption penalty if we get our housemovers mortgage through them.
P.S The penalty is 2% of 31k at the moment reducing to 1% on 1st April.
I wish we could find a deal which could allow us to tell B&B to stuff it.
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