Foreign income mortgages

[MissSnowdrop]

Does anyone have any experience of residential mortgages with a foreign income? We are moving back to UK and initially renting but would like to buy within a year. Husband is an EU National. Our income will be paid in Euros? After a lot of internet research, it doesn't look too hopeful. Anyone had any success securing one? Thank you in advance.

We are just about to complete on our home. Around 30% of our income is DH's foreign military pension - paid in $ into a US bank account (they absolutely will not pay it in another currency or into a foreign bank account to avoid tax evasion).

We went through a broker and he was only able to find one provider who would even vaguely consider taking the foreign income into account - and he discounted them because he said they were very nervous about it and their offers reflected this (horrible interest rates etc). Apparently the lenders don't like taking the additional risk associated with exchange rate fluctuations, which I guess makes sense.

So it's possible, but based on our experience you won't get a good deal. I would suggest that EU-income might be looked upon more favourably, but with all the Brexit noise at the moment this might not be the case!

We just applied based on our UK income only. We can buy less house, but our monthly income is still what it is and so we'll pay the mortgage down early (with the income they won't acknowledge!) so all's well that ends well....

Good luck!

Speak to London and Country brokers, theyre free.

Also consider looking at buying while you are still abroad, tgen moving back.
We gave had 2 brokers approach us offering expat mortgages whilst living in the middle east.

Or get a SAAB/HSBC international account, and talk to them about mortgages.

We are in the EU and when We tried remortgaging from abroad and with 40% equity we only got offered one with about 7% interest.

My husband works in Europe and has a European salary.i work in the UK and have a UK salary. We did it with hsbc but we needed a 15% deposit and we were premier customers and knew our premier advisor woman well and she pushed it through for us and pleaded our case. We got a decent interest rate and it was about 4 years ago.

It was hsbc in Harpenden.

Thank you everyone, really appreciate your feedback. Xandersmom, who was the mortgage broker that you spoke to? I have spoken to London and Country some months ago and they were a little vague. Mainly because they said things change all the time and because we weren't applying immediately they couldn't give us up to date info. They said call back when we were ready to go for it. But they did say it wasn't particularly favourable with foreign income. I have looked at Barclays international. They give international mortgages, if you meet the criteria (have loads of money!) Anyone used them? We didn't really want to buy until we had a feel for the area around where we plan to rent as obviously don't want to make a very expensive mistake! But maybe we don't have a choice if we want to own our own place.

We have had two mortgages with Nat West using a US$ income.

We have never banked with Nat West either.

We used Barclays International for our mortgage. DH had worked overseas and this meant his income wasn't recognised for the three year history when we applied for the mortgage. He was back working in the UK at this point but the usual mortgage people were not allowed to take account of his income in the two prior years.

The rate was slightly higher but we had no other option. We also had to become a customer of Barclays international and have a certain sum deposited to get the rates offered. That deposit was then able to be withdrawn as soon as the mortgage loan was made.

The processes were a bit different and it was a protracted affair. We have now got the three year UK history again so are about to remortgage to a more competitive rate. Once the loan goes through, it is treated as if it is Woolwich just like their domestic loans.

NatWest declined us despite us being a customer with them for years and years and despite us previously having a mortgage with them which we had paid off.

Ruhrpott - HSBC declined us and we have been with them for 20 odd years whereas Nat West have been the most competitive twice!

DH's guaranteed US income for the rest of his life (pension) and before that his salary, has been paid into our bank account for 16 years.

Very odd, mad in fact .

We went through the mortgaging process last year and had quite a few options, Halifax and Santander were also willing to give us a mortgage but Nat West were the most competitive. We used a small time local broker.

Barchester, just to clarify...you applied in 2016 with a foreign income and got some High street offers? Where you actually in UK when you applied? My husband also has a salary for life, pension included. Paid in Euro.

Trufflethewuffle, are you able to shop around for a better deal because you receive an income in sterling now? I think I will investigate the Barclays international route tomorrow and see what they say. I wonder if we took that for a couple of years to get our foot on the ladder and then try to find a better deal. Do you think we would be looked on more favourably if we built up our credit score for a few years paying Barclays and then tried to swap further down the line? We would still have a foreign income though.

Yes OP, we moved back to the UK in 2009 and have had two mortgages with Nat West since then (with a year's gap in between), the last one when we moved last year. Went to a local mortgage broker in a tiny town and had offers from three banks.

We have income from the UK and US these days but our first Nat West mortgage was on a US income alone.

MissSnowdrop I'm happy to send you our broker's details if you want to PM me? Not sure where you are but if he can't help you then he might have mates in your area who can.

Interesting to read other posters' experiences; we've also been with Barclays International for many years, have DH's US pension for life, have our life savings with them (not too shabby a number) and they wouldn't touch us with a bargepole. Go figure .

I think some of the reluctance in our case was that DH is a US citizen and the new FATCA rules are making non-US banks incredibly nervous. NatWest even closed my account and sent me a cheque for the balance out of the blue when i had to disclose to them that i had become a US citizen - I'd had a current account with them since i started my first Saturday job 30 years ago and never been overdrawn.

I do think that for people who don't have a textbook scenario, a broker is the way to go. Some of them are free, ours is costing a few hundred pounds but has earned every penny of it so i don't begrudge it at all (when the lender with the best rates turned us down he went in to meet the branch manager personally on our behalf to explain our situation, and we've ended up getting our mortgage with them).

Yes, we are able to look elsewhere now as we have the three years history of taxable income recorded with HMRC. DH was paying tax overseas for one year which meant most domestic lenders could not take his income into account even though we could prove it and show it had been declared although overseas.

It was not a credit history issue, simply that lenders would only take into account income that was declared for tax with HMRC.

The irony was that, by the time we were applying for the mortgage, DH was working back here. Initially we got sent by Barclays domestic arm to International because we didn't fit the domestic criteria only to have International say they couldn't help us as we were no longer international clients!

Very frustrating at the time.

We were a bit different in that we were in Germany for 20 years then both moved back to the uk, sold the german house and bought a uk one with a small NatWest mortgage. Both worked in the uk for three years and paid off the NatWest mortgage by overpaying. Then DH moved to a job in Holland with a huge multinational company and started earning again in euros. We sold the uk house and wanted to buy another uk house with a mortgage. DH now earning euros and me earning pounds. NatWest refused point blank even though we had just paid off a mortgage with them and would only give a small mortgage based on my earnings and Hsbc gave us a much bigger one based on DH euro earnings and my uk earnings but as I said only after the premier banking woman got involved.

I did look at Barclays international too but their interest rates were a lot higher.

We have just bought a house in The Netherlands now too and that was really easy to get a mortgage! Would even give us a thirty year one even though we are both over 50!