Renewing your mortgage whilst on SMP?

[PamSco]

Has anyone done this? Do banks just look at yur SMP or take your income on your return into account?

I've just realised my 2 year fix is up in the middle of planned mat leave. I know we can stay on SVR but that is pretty crap given the reduced income.

Thanks,
Pam

Is the SVR a bad deal? I'm one of those that fixed at 6% back in 2008 when the SVR I would have automatically gone to ended up nearer 2%. If only I'd waited a couple of months rather than leaping straight into a new deal. Not sure about your specific question, sorry.

SVR can be a bad deal, depends what the interest rate forecast is. Your timing wasn't great I guess bbecause you fixed just before rates decreased hence SVR being lower than your fix, but then it is impossible to 2nd guess when interest rates are going to go up.

As interest rates are rock bottom SVR will be higher than current rate by c2-3%. My fix isn't great, but if interest rates go up by say 2% now then the SVR will go up to about 5% is my guess which is a fair whack from my fix.

We can cope for a few months but would really begin to struggle when my SMP stops at 39 weeks. That's why I was wondering about the banks and how they judge your income.

when is your fixed rate up?
With nationwide you can get a new product within 3 months of the old 1 finishing, so if you were still in work, or on the 90% you may be ok.

I mean up to 3 months before it finishes!

Sadly the timing stinks. Mat leave starts Nov 2011, salary ends c Feb 2012 (12 wks) then mortgage up in August but I don't go back to work until Dec 2012 though salary should start Nov as I'll take a month holiday. The bigger risk for us that there could be redundancies next year as well but at least I have a wee bit of protection from that.

Be careful dealing with morgage while on mat leave ( or even pg) as they often work on the assumption you won't return to work & will ignore your salary.

I renewed ours (joint) while on mat leave. I had to declare that I would return to work by signing some letter to the mortgage dudes worked though!

Give the Equal Rights Commission a ring - I'm sure things have changed since the new Equalities Law was passed last October. They are not supposed to discriminate against you because you've had a baby.

Our SVR is loads lower than the fixed we were on til last year. We're saving around £200 a month.

I moved just after returning to work from mat leave

there was no point giving the mortgage company my previous wage slips as i was on smp by then. They wrote to my employers requesting details of my income to support the application. HTH.

We fixed for 3 years

My mort company don't take any additional info if you are taking another product with them.

Thanks everyone. I reckon I'll try the most attractive offer at the time using a work letter, with the back up of knowing at least I'll have SVR to fall back (up) to. It's weird isn't it. I bought my first flat not that long ago and my fix was 5.5% and SVR got to 8% at the time. Now SVR is genuinely a good bet. But I doubt for long, we are due rate rises and SVR will rise quicker is my guess.