What would make you worry about applying for a mortgage or remortgage – let’s talk about it with L&C Mortgages

[YanaMumsnet]

There are lots of situations that people think would make securing a mortgage or remortgage tricky, such as while pregnant or on maternity leave, going part-time or freelance, or maybe while on probation in a new job. With this in mind, L&C Mortgages would like to find out more about the concerns and risks you are faced with or might even put you off from applying for a mortgage or remortgage.

Here’s what L&C has to say: “At L&C we make mortgages easy. There are lots of myths about how difficult it is to apply for one in certain situations but we can demystify them for you. If you’re looking for a mortgage deal while on maternity leave, are pregnant, going part-time or on a contract we’re here to help you. We search across 90 lenders to find the best deal for you and our qualified advisers use their experience and knowledge of which lenders are likely to be understanding about your situation. Our service is fee free and we’ll be there from start to finish taking care of the paperwork. Our aim is to make life easier for you so we’d really like to know what situations would concern parents or parents-to-be when applying for a mortgage or remortgage.”

So we are asking you, when do you think is the right time for you and your family to get a mortgage or to remortgage your home? Which personal circumstances do you think can be a problem to secure a mortgage? Were you able to secure a mortgage or remortgage in a tricky situation? What was your tricky situation? What advice would you give others in your situation?

Whatever your experiences and concerns are of your family’s mortgage situation, share them on the thread below and you’ll be entered into a prize draw where one MNer will win a £300 voucher of their choice (from a list).

Thanks and good luck with the prize draw.
MNHQ
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[shushymcshush]

Historical tricky situation: I was doing fine with our mortgage for 8 yrs. DH was made redundant and after a short while got a job, taking a 20% pay cut. All was fine, we managed. I then had my hours cut at work, losing 40% of my salary. I tried getting other jobs, but no one would take me on as I was pregnant at the time. I then got made redundant. I asked the mortgage company if there was any help they could provide, even to adjust the length of mortgage etc, just to see us over this tricky period and reduce the payments by a tiny amount. I had secured work self-employed, but wasn't earning as much.

Nope. Nothing. Lots of lovely stress whilst welcoming a new baby into the world.

If they couldn't help/make readjustments, it would be interesting to know if we could have remortgaged/moved mortgage.

[PorridgeAgainAbney]

No worries at the moment as we still have 6yr to go on our deal, but when we tookout our first mortgage we were in a pretty precarious position: I was on the verge of being made redundant (company was still trading but our pay had been delayed) and DH had only been in his job a few weeks. Financial advisor basically said it was up to us as I wasn't obligated to share the impending situation with my job, so we went ahead. Now, I'm far more risk averse which is why we fixed our last deal for 10 years!

[ButterflyOfFreedom]

I'd worry when I'm on maternity leave then going back part time... income obviously decreases...
Also I know child care costs are taken into consideration which is a significant outgoing for us.

[Howmanysleepsnow]

Our income has decreased since we got our current mortgage so we couldn’t get a mortgage for the same amount when we tried to switch provider (would’ve saved us £200pcm) despite being able to evidence meeting payments consistently for 8 years.

[Ratbagcatbag]

I have to say that brexit is a worry, because if house prices do drop then although I was at 90% LtV that could change.

I'm now also a single parent. I work full time and have a good salary, but equally I have a credit card. I've been paying x5 off the minimum payment, but I do worry if it would affect my affordability.
As in my plan for now is to keep paying the card off and I'm fixed for 5 years so switch the overpayments to my mortgage next year.
I find the differences between companies staggering too. There was 100k difference between what one lender would let me have and what another would. As I went for a smaller house it wasn't an issue but I do wonder what will happen if I decide to go for another bigger property in the future.

[Nottheshrinkingcapgrandpa]

We need to remortgage soon, and I just don’t know if we should do a 2,3 or even 5 year fix. Brexit uncertainy means that where I’d usually have a fairly good idea of what we would do, this time I don’t have a clue!

[Asuwere]

I found it really frustrating when I was on a career break, we were still overpaying the mortgage every month (extra 50% of payments) yet because I didn't have an income, we couldn't remortgage as it was deemed we couldn't afford the lower payments we applied for! Makes no sense.

[1969angep]

I've never actually re-mortgaged and as we have an exceptionally competitive we're unlikely to. However as someone who once worked in the mortgage business it can be a useful thing to do to access better rates/terms with a new lender or if you need to release more equity from your house - ie for improvements etc. In reality, as I've stopped working since we last moved, we'd be unlikely to get a better deal/extra borrowing anyway lol.

[goose1964]

Not me but DS and his wife. They are renting and have never been in arrears but when they looked at mortgaging a similar property they were told that they didn't earn enough. Despite the fact that the repayments would be a lot less than their rent.

[NightsOfCabiria]

I’ve just remortgaged as my fixed term deal came to an end. Id love to buy a bigger/ better house but being female, single and 50 put me in a difficult position as, even though I have a great work pension (25% of salary contribution), and a relatively high salary, I can never find one that extends beyond retirement, so I have to cram repayment into 17 years or less. Funnily enough, my single older male friends - even those who are self employed on half my income - don't seem to have this problem. I’d also love to buy a buy to let but again, face the same issues. I use L&C.

[juicyjuicymangoes]

At the moment I'm finding it hard to assess how much I am able to borrow since I work shifts and on calls and am on a training scheme in the nhs so my pay is going up all the time....my base salary is a lot lower than my actual take home. We'd like to buy near London so being able to borrow as much as possible could really help in the long run if we can afford a two bed property - how would this work please?

[PickledChicory]

In some ways we are in a better position earning wise than when we took out our mortgage. However 3 lots of maternity leave and some accumulated debts mean I would have concerns about moving up the property ladder and if we could get a larger mortgage. Also interest rates worry me fixed vs tracker mortgage. V difficult to know at this time what interest rates will do.

[BlackberriesAndCream]

I worry because I am self-employed, and I worry that they will not let me re-mortgage for some reason when my deal is up; not because I can't pay, but because the affordability tests will somehow have changed, or there will be rules about the mortgage not being valid if you work at the property, or some other thing like that.

I wish they would give you actual advice, and not just present options and tell you that you have to decide and they can't advise you what the pros and cons are.

[Notanalien]

I'm what's known as a "mortgage prisoner" where my existing mortgage was sold to a non-lending company who simply bought the mortgage debt portfolio off one of the collapsed building societies. This company will not offer new deals to existing customers so a large number of people are stuck on a high interest rate as offers are not available to us. The only option is applying for a new mortgage elsewhere but as I was made redundant some years ago and then became self-employed, I have never again had the sort of salary needed to qualify for one, and then of course the rules on lending tightened up so the amounts offered on the basis of your salary are now lower than they once were - so all these things put together mean I'm well and truly stuck and paying well over what is available at other lenders.

[Notanalien]

Sorry hit send too soon! The point of the story is - I wish some lenders would look kindly upon mortgage prisoners and take into account more factors than just plain numbers when deciding whether to make a mortgage offer to someone.

[BuzzShitbagBobbly]

@Notanalien have you heard of this campaign? Hopefully your situation will improve if this gets some traction.

www.moneysavingexpert.com/news/2019/03/fca-mortgage-prisoners-announcement/

[Notanalien]

Thank you @BuzzShitbagBobbly - fingers crossed, it seems a bit of a way off but there may be hope.

[SeekingShade]

When getting a mortgage whilst self-employed, I was advised to put myself down as 'homemaker' and just use my husband's salary by the bank mortgage arranger.

[buffythevampireslayer91]

I'm currently on maternity leave and trying to secure a mortgage. It concerns me that my salary won't be taken into account by some mortgage providers even though I will be returning to work in a few months. I'm also concerned about when time comes to remortgage, what if interest rates have gone up? What if our circumstances are different? All around it's pretty nerve wracking especially as we are first time buyers and putting every pence we have spare into our deposit and fees.

[Ftumch]

I worry that my husbands change of job will make it difficult to get a new mortgage when our house sells, as he my still be in his probationary period. I'm also worried about the effect Brexit may have on interest rates before we manage to move.

[angell74]

I worry about my children. I’m trying to save money to help with their deposits because the way things are now they won’t be moving out until they are 50!!

[Cotswoldmama]

I had to get a new mortgage whilst I was on maternity leave, I was also going to be doing slightly reduced hours once I returned to work. I was worried this might cause a problem as I was working full time with my first mortgage and it was much smaller. But it was simpler than I thought as the mortgage advisor basically helped us with everything.

[Chocolate50]

We have always had a mortgage with the same provider & its always been a fairly easy process to renew & change it.
The bank though don't always make sure that we have the best most compatible deal on our mortgage which means that I usually do a lot of leg work to find out the best mortgage for our household

[Tonkatol]

We are in a difficult situation at the moment. Our plan has always been for me to return to work full-time when my youngest went off to secondary school. We had an interest-only mortgage for a number of years, and have never defaulted or been late on a payment.

Unfortunately, over the past 6 or so years, I have had health issues and have had to give up work and am on disability benefits. During this time our mortgage was with Northern Rock and, because our income reduced, we weren't in a position to remortgage. Last year, we had to sell our property because I could no longer manage the steps outside our property and struggled with the stairs in the property. We are currently renting a property and are now looking to purchase a property on a part buy - part rent basis. I'm just worried that now my husband is over 50 we may struggle to find a mortgage lender who will accept us.

[Greensmurf1]

It’s really hard to know whether to get a really long term fixed mortgage with a rare that is a little higher than the shorter term fixed rate options. On the one hand, you would know how much our payments would be for 10 years, but on the other hand, the interest rates could drop so we’d feel like we were paying too much. What’s going to happen with house prices in all the confusing Brexit scenarios? How will the value of our home compare with the cost of our mortgage over the long term? How do you decide whether the product fees are worth it? What if we have to sell and face a huge early repayment charge?