Mortgage lenders/underwriting checks on employment

[GlassOfProsecco]

I'm currently going through a separation & trying to get a mortgage.

My permanent contract is 0.5wte = 23K.

I've had an increase in hours temporarily until the end of the financial year to 0.9 = 41K.

So while I have 3 months payslips showing the higher amount, I think it's too risky to borrow based on my temporary hours.

I'm guessing a mortgage lender would confirm that with my employers?

My ex seems to think I can borrow a more, based on my current hours, and give me a crappy settlement based on this - but I'm trying to tell him that is not the case!

Can anyone advise?

If you make out that you earn more than you do in order to get a mortgage, that's fraud. It's a criminal offence.

I'm not planning to!!

I'm trying to explain to my ex that I can only borrow based on my part-time permanent hours, not on my increased temporary hours.

He's trying to give me a shitty settlement & assuming I can afford to house myself based on my temporary hours - and thinking I will be stupid enough to do it!!!

I think you enter your main hours and then they consider your extra, you can get mortgage based on extra hours or bonus but I have no idea how much. Why don't you speak to a mortgage advisor? They're mostly free! :)

It will be your permanent income that is taken into consideration and not your temporary position as this is giing to reduce. They wouldnt treat the additional as overtime either as it isnt overtime and currently most lenders have stopped considering things such as overtime and bonuses due to the current situation and so would be worked on your permanent basic salary

Thank you @ Jumanji - that is exactly what I thought.

The settlement from a separation has no bearing on the potential mortgage you could raise and vice versa he cannot give a lower settlement due to you getting a higher mortgage offer.

It’s absolutely up to you how much money you borrow, within the lending criteria set down by the bank. Simply don’t apply for more than you are comfortable with.

You ex will need to agree to a fair financial settlement and this is separate to whatever you can afford to borrow

When we speak to our broker we talk less about how much money we earn or the maximum we can borrow and more about how much we want to spend. So we will say "we have £X equity and we don't want to pay more than £Y per month" and he comes back with a budget. For us personally it's to do with being able to afford the mortgage on one income but the figure the broker gives is higher than we would be able to borrow on one salary. Hope that makes sense.