Question for mortgage advisors...

wymondham

Hyperthetical question here out of curiosity .....

If you had a meeting with a FTB who said they would like to buy a house now, what would your professional recommendation be with the current market? - assume they had 10/20% deposit and able to meet their mortgage payments. Would you explain the climate, or assume the person was aware etc....

_Andy_

(Ex broker here)

I'd definetely have a chat about the current climate. That being said, I always found as a broker, the more you advised someone not to do something, the more they wanted it.

Fergie73

I'm a potential FTBer and have been to see 2 brokers recently (both tied to EAs). It was interesting. One of them was very definitely trying to put me off, although not in so many words. The other one just seemed delighted to have found an FTBer who could buy and was very upfront about the fact that she was simply having to tell customer after customer that there was no chance of them getting a mortgage and they'd have to rent.

Similar story with a viewer from an EA - really being refreshingly honest with answers to questions about the housing market. Obviously none of them know what's going to happen, but all were advising caution.

Toughluck

Depends where you want to buy, what sort of property it is, whether you intend to stay short medium or long term. Is it becasue you have a family and need space etc. Many factors come into it. If you want a blunt answer.......valuations are still coming in lower on re-mortgage surveys therefore if you are putting 10% down you may want to consider it more than if you were putting 20% down.

Leon_W

An interesting question.

I think that to be unaware of the current housing and mortgage markets you would have to have lived in a cave this past year so a certain amount of 'market awareness' would be presumed on my part when talking to a FTB.

As regards being a mortgage adviser and the housing market, I don't really see it being within my remit to advise either way. As long as I have explained the scenario for rising/falling markets you have to leave the final decision to grown adults. I often get asked what interest rates are going to do or what house prices are going to do, the honest truth is I haven't got a clue as that is far too big a picture for me to have any influence over whatsoever. As long as both sides of the coin are explained then all should be well.

My job as a mortgage advisor is to advise on mortgages, not put the worlds to rights, and as much as people like to draw you on the subject of rates and houseprices etc, I very rarely give a definate answer as in this job you know it'll come back and bite you on the bum ! "You said rates were going down" "You said house prices would rise" etc etc. I've heard it all before !

So to sum up. Your FTBers have to be informed of the consequences of higher rates, falling prices etc and how this would effect them, fair enough. But if they still want to go ahead, I'm happy and the lenders happy, who am I to not transact the business ? The issue of rates and house prices is well out of my hands.

Regards

wymondham

Interesting responses, thank you!!