Renewing mortgage - advice please!

suzieq

My OH owns our home, and has been getting a new mortgage every 2 years since he moved in 6 yrs ago, but has always gone back to the estate agent he bought the house from and used their in-house adviser.

The mortgage is up in June, and OH wants to put me on the mortgage now. I don't really think he has gone down the best route in the past, am I right? What would be the best route - IFA? And is there any benefit of going for a longer term mortgage?

Is there an impartial site I can go to read all I need to know about mortgages? I guess here, probably! I tend to have a better brain for things like this than OH, so am hoping I can get us a better mortgage when we renew.

Thanks

Suzie ~x~

Gorgeous_George

Personally, I cannot be bothered with swapping mortgages every two years - life's too short. I'm with Britannia on a flexible mortgage at Base Rate +0.75 percent. My savings effectively earn the same rate tax-free and it works for me.

You really need to add up all the costs such as arrangement fees, redemption fees etc. I doubt many work out as cheap as the headline rate suggests. I'm not sure about the APR but that should give amore honest indication. Whether APR includes all the costs I don't know.



GG

Ian_W

Hi suzieq,
Yup, this one is a good starting point. Several good articles on the mortgage section of the site to get you clued up and links to comparison sites to get an idea of what's available. Whether you use any of the brokers on the site is up to you but in many cases EA advisers aren't truely independent, often tied [or incentivised] to a small panel of lenders. If you prefer face to face then find one locally on https://www.unbiased.co.uk by entering your post code and indicating you're interested in mortgages.
Changing every couple of years does involve fees but provided you work these into the figures you can still save money by doing so. Taking a longer deal does help spread the fees but don't forget it can restrict you to the whim of your lender if you need to borrow more or move during any penalty period.
Also note what GG says, if it works for you too, fair e nuff, not compulsary this MSE lark.