Is now a good time to remortgage?

[Itsmybirthdaytoday20]

Got an email from MSE about remortgaging now because rates will drop.

Can anyone explain this to me in layman’s terms please? Would you need to switch to a variable rate to benefit from this and are rates set to go up more so once this is all over?

We have a small mortgage with 14 years left but didn’t take a deal when our fix ended because we weren’t sure if we were planning to move/extend.

We still aren’t sure so is it not worth remortgaging now in that case?

Also - we have about £4300 on a credit card (0%) and it’s a bit of a millstone round our necks. Would it make sense to borrow extra to pay that off? I’m getting figures of about £260 per month with this included in the mortgage. I currently pay £105 for the card alone.

Any help appreciated. Thanks!

No it isn't a good time because you'll be lucky to get appointments with people. My dp is a mortgage adviser and he's been told no more face to face appointments will be booked. You could do it over the phone or internet, but there's still the matter of surveyors, conveyors and admin staff needing to work to complete the application.

You probably want to concentrate on getting rid of the credit card if you can manage the payments because if you convert it to a long term interest bearing product, the interest over time is likely to be more. Putting the credit card on the mortgage is also a risk if you take it as an invitation to be able to spend more money, because many people who do that, run up credit card debts alongside their new, bigger mortgage, so get into a worse mess than if they'd just cut back a bit and concentrated on paying off the card.

As to whether it is worth remortgaging, it depends on what rate you are on now. We've never fixed or taken a short term deal and we're currently paying 0.6% so nothing these days can touch it. However, if you're on a standard rate, you might be able to make a saving although MSE has reported that many fixed rates have actually increased since the base rate cut

You probably want to take a look at your whole budget to see if you can free up money to pay down the credit card. Have a think about how long this might take and if you can transfer to another 0% deal at the end of the current one. Because if you can pay it off over the next 2/3 years on 0% deals, that's probably worth a bit of short term pain rather than stringing it along for the length of a mortgage term.