mortgage rates....advice appreciated!

[ThatVikRinA22]

anyone know of any good ones out there for a 20% LTV?

had house valued - cant move as dont have enough equity. so the estate agent badgered and badgered us to go and see their mortgage advisor....waste of sodding time that was! was in about 5 mins, they looked, they said they cant find a better rate, we left. the estate agent looked mortified and came chasing after us saying "that was quick!".....yeah. it was.

we are currently paying standard variable rate, but our mortgage is made up of 90k mortgage = standard variable
20k secured loan for improvements = 3.99%
total repayment is £686

so they basically took one look and turfed us out! i have a so called independent advisor coming out to the house tomorrow to see if they can find us a better deal.....what do you think our chances are? the house has been valued at £139,950 but a realistic price for selling would be more like £136,000

do you reckon we should fix it? or go with a tracker? would have to move the whole lot though...even the bit at 3.99 which is cheap.

Go to a proper whole of market broker like Charcol - they charge for their services if you go ahead with them but they will know if you stand a realistic chance of getting a better deal. Sounds like your LTV is more like 65% though, not 20% (excluding loan) or 80% including loan?

Are repayments really tight, is that the problem? If so and this is unlikely to change, I would look around for a longer term fixed rate deal because personally I think rates are going to go up sooner rather than later, but that's just me!

thanks - im wondering about rates going up too.

we had a broker around tonight who went through everything with me, but he also has a fee of £299 if we go ahead.

we seem to have 3 options, sell up and move but this will be wayyyy more than we can afford (mortgage of eyewatering figures so thats a no go for us)

we could remortgage for exactly what we owe

or we could remortgage for a little bit more and do the garden - its large and untouched - very in need of an over haul to enjoy it....

we are thinking option 3. if we are stuck we might as well be stuck with a useable outside space.

now the next issue - my bank account is always going into its overdraft - will that scare away the lenders? DS and DD have said i could stick their savings into it to boost the numbers until the process is done...do you think an overdrawn bank account would affect the chances of a remortgage? it always goes back into the black on pay day but inbetween it goes up to quite a bit....what do you think?

Doing the garden sounds like a good plan.

Would option 3 mean a loan to value of more than 80%, though? If so, I think your options would be more limited, e.g., the lowest interest deals won't be available. A good broker should go through all your outgoings, debts (e.g., overdraft) and then be able to say with a degree of certainty whether and from whom you could get the mortgage you need. He or she should also run through an offer in principle for you if you want.

We've just taken out a tracker mortgage with Yorkshire Building Society. It is 2.49% above base rate for 2 years and is available up to 85% LTV.

Taking out a fixed or a tracker depends on your individual circumstances. If you have a fixed budget with little room for movement then you should get a fixed. If you have enough income to absorb a few rate rises then go for a tracker. Our plan is to overpay our mortgage by as much as possible every month, that way when our discount rate comes to the end of its life we will be able to remortgage with much more equity in our home and get a good interest rate.

From speaking to a few people (financial advisors and mortgage reps) most seem to think that it will be another 6 months at least before interest rates start to rise. Even when they do start to rise I just cannot see them going up in large leaps - perhaps 0.25% at a time - as the economy is still so fragile. There are a lot of people who are only just managing to pay their mortgages at the moment and even a small rate rise will push them over the edge and send the economy tumbling back again.

Of course there are no guarantees.