Re-mortgaging the best option? Self employed and unable to work

yournewfavourite

Hi,

I am a self employed plasterer and have been working for 45 yrs. I have recently had a serious operation leaving me unable to work for around the next 12 months at least. At the moment, our outgoings match our incomings without any day-to-day living monies to spare. I am in receipt of employer support allowance, and am in the midst of applying for disability benefit until I recover and am able to work again.

The upshot of this is that we have to sell our car and I have considered selling our house. We do not want to sell our house with the current housing market being the way it is and, being a builder, it still needs bits and pieces of work in places (!), something I plan to do when better.

We own the house completely, so I was considering a re-mortgage or offset mortgage to free up some cash to live on. I could then pay interest only and pay off the total when we eventually sell in 2-4 years time. I have been told that I may need to transfer some equity to my son and he may need to come onto our mortgage as lenders will not sign off the mortgage due to my lack of income (he has a steady strong income). It is very frustrating having worked and paid taxes all of my life to be stuck in this situation, with lack of benefits and a poor response from lenders. If only I had taken out serious illness cover! Luckily my son is fine to do so, though it may affect his own chances of securing a first time buyer mortgage.

Does anyone have thoughts on this, or know of any risks? Any other suggestions/solutions would be gratefully received!

Many thanks in advance

CLAPTON

how much is the imcome short fall?
could you son simply lend you the money on a monthly basis and keep everything simply and less expensive (no mortgage set up fees, no mortgage interest, no solictor costs etc.

Jenniefour

I don't have any suggestions about your current curcumstances but I do have one regarding being self employed - when you're back on your feeet again and working how about aiming to save a lot more so you have a cushion. I am self employed and when I started many years ago my accountant recommended I build up my savings so that I had the equivalent of six months earnings - in the event I ever had to take time off work for anything other than planned holidays. As an alternative to critical illness cover and so on. I had to scrimp for a few years to get this built up but I have stuck to it like glue ever since and it has seen me through one or two difficult times where I didn't have to worry about money.