Remortgaging and redundancy

soup_chef

My wife and I have a mortgage whose 5-year fixed rate period is up in July. Next month (April), my wife is being made redundant from her permanent, full-time job and has lined up a 12-month contract as her next employment. We have a toddler who will be in nursery all week. We have a small amount of double glazing finance to pay (about £50 per month for the rest of the year) but completely clear our credit card balances every month and have no other debt. I have been looking at remortgaging to obtain another fixed rate.

Having just gone through an initial affordability check with one lender and been turned down, I'm wondering whether there's much point in chasing any others or whether I should just resign myself to being stuck on our current lender's SVR (or any deal they offer) until my wife next lands a permanent role.

It seems that my wife's earnings (because of the fixed term) and her redundancy payout (because it's a one off) can't be factored into the affordability test, while the nursery fees must be factored in (even though we would take our little one out of nursery should my wife ever be out of work). It feels like *I* know we can comfortably afford the mortgage (the amount borrowed would be less than three times my salary) but that the standard test judges we can't because it only sees half the picture.

How much discretion do more senior bank or building society mortgage staff have to look at factors beyond the standard test? Would using a broker make any difference?

Wh05apk

Different lenders use different affordability criteria, however affordability is something that cannot be over-ruled, the FSA are now obsessed with affordability.

It may be you can look at other lenders through a broker, who may be a little less restrictive.